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EDITED BY
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OHIO
FIRST FRUITS OF THE ORDINANCE OF 1787
BY
RUFUS KING
With a Supplementary Chapter by Theodore Clarke Smith , Assistant Professor of American History in Ohio State University .
BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY (Cbe Ifttoettfibe Cambridge
1903
Copyright, 1888,
By RUFUS KING.
Copyright, 1903,
By HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO.
All rights reserved
The Riverside Press , Cambridge , Mass., V. S. A. Electrotyped and Printed by H. 0. Houghton & Company.
PUBLISHERS’ NOTE.
In issuing a new edition of Ohio , it has seemed desirable to add a supplementary chapter dealing with the history of Ohio since the Civil War. This chapter has been written by Theodore Clarke Smith, Assistant Professor of American History in the Ohio State University.
4 Park Street, March , 1903.
IN HONOR OP
(tbe Mtn
WHO FOUNDED THE TERRITORY NORTHWEST OP THE RIVER OHIO, A. D. 1787.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
L Introductory 1
II. The Wilderness . . „ „ „ . 10
III. Under which King? 29
IV. The British Conquest . 46
V. Annexed to Quebec ...... 80
VI. The Moravians 119
VII. The Northwest Territory . 161
VIII. The Early Settlers ...... 189
IX. St. Clair’s Administration and the Indian War 229
X. Ohio becomes a State • 262
XI. The Pioneers . 296
XII. War and Debt — 1812-20 . 320
XIII. Progress 346
XIV. Ohio in the War for the Union . . . 368
XV. Ohio since the Civil War . . . . 401
APPENDIX.
No. 1. The King’s Proclamation in 1763 : an Ex-
tract 419
No. 2. Nathan Dane as to the Authorship of the
Ordinance of 1787 422
No. 3. Ballad : “ Sainclaire’s Defeat ”... 427 No. 4. Letter of General Harrison . . . 430
No. 5. The Grape and its Gradual Failure in Ohio 432
OHIO.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY.
Ohio — now third among the States in her strength of population — was admitted as one of the United States in 1803, and in the order of time, therefore, is seventeenth in the galaxy of the Union.
In the broad domain between the Ohio River, the Mississippi, and the chain of northern lakes known of old as the Northwest Territory, this State comprehends most of the space between the Ohio River and Lake Erie ; and usually is esti- mated to be about two hundred miles square, an area of 25,600,000 acres. The Domesday-book, or tax duplicate of the State, for the year 1883, showed that 26,713,421 acres of land were re- turned in that year, to which the acres of the cities and towns should be added. The returns for the year previous were 25,507,981 acres, and those of 1884 were but 24,971,170 ; rendering it somewhat difficult to ascertain officially just how large a state Ohio is.
2
OHIO.
Its northerly extreme is at the northeast cor- ner, close upon the forty-second parallel of lati- tude. Its most southerly point is in the bend of the Ohio River, opposite the boundary line be- tween West Virginia and Kentucky, or about thirty-eight and a half degrees north latitude.
The landmark of the State is the ridge of hills dividing the basin of the Ohio from that of the great lakes. It begins east of Buffalo, and, following the general course of the lake shore, enters Ohio near the line between the counties of Ashtabula and Trumbull, thence extending diag- onally south of west across the State. The con- tiguity of these basins is such that Lake Chau- tauqua, a feeder of the Ohio, is but nine miles from Lake Erie, and the heads of streams which flow into it are not more than three miles from that lake.
Lake Chautauqua is said to be 726 feet above Lake Erie ; but as the Ohio River at Pittsburg is but 172 feet above that level, it would seem that this must be more nearly the height of Lake Chautauqua above the ocean. At the Muskingum the level of the Ohio at low water is eight feet below that of Lake Erie. At the Scioto it is ninety feet below the lake, and at Cincinnati 133 feet. The lake level being 564 feet above that of the ocean, the altitudes at these points will thus appear.
The State, therefore, lies in a zone and environ- ments which, with other conditions to be men-
INTRODUCTORY .
3
tioned, afford a double climate and temperature, signally favorable to a variety of soil and pro- ducts. The summers of southern Ohio, and the winters in the northern part, are sometimes in- temperate, but the spring and autumn, in both sections, compensate for the excess. The equable temperature which Lake Erie diffuses upon the adjoining country has proved of immense value to orchards, vineyards, and pastures, while in the southern part of the State these have suffered much deterioration in fifty years.
The geological formation of the State is most interesting, but cannot adequately be sketched in this narrow compass, and from recent develop- ments will, perhaps, require to be reconsidered. The outcrop produces the elevated table land ex- tending from Pennsylvania southwesterly toward the heads of the Scioto, Miami, and Auglaise riv- ers, crowned with broken hills, which, according to railway and geological reports, rise in Richland County to an elevation of 802 feet, and in Logan County 773 feet above the lake level, or 1,366 feet in the former, and 1,337 feet in the latter, above the ocean. These, if correct, are the highest points in the State, though not so reported in early times.
The water-shed, thus traversing the State, has divided the rivers uniformly into a course north- wardly to the lake or southwardly to the Ohio ; of incalculable advantage in the early growth of the country, when these waterways were almost
4
OHIO.
the only channels for transporting its heavy pro- ductions to a market. Their heads are so closely interlaced in the highlands, that the Indians and early traders easily transferred their light canoes from one to the other. The great valley of the Maumee, or Miami of the Lakes, and those of the Sandusky, the Cuyahoga, and several lesser streams, drain the northern part of the State into Lake Erie and the St. Lawrence. The Maho- ning, Muskingum, Hocking, Scioto, and the two Miamis carry off the waters of a larger surface to the Ohio and the Gulf of Mexico. These latter streams were once so considerable that, in the freshets, valuable cargoes of provisions were sent regularly to New Orleans in the Kentucky boats better known as the flatboat, and in keel-boats. In the early period there was a confident theory that the streams increased as the country was settled. It seems many severe droughts had occurred. The mouth of the Little Miami, as Gen- eral Butler reported in 1783, was literally dried up. Captain Trent related that in crossing over from Mad River to the mouth of the Scioto River, in 1752, his horses and dogs died of thirst, not a stream or spring being found. But time has reversed the theory. Of all these rivers, the Maumee barely holds its own.
This happy intervening of rivers, valleys, and uplands, with a soil nowhere sterile, but gener- ally rich or fertile, covered with forests or open woodlands, and spreading out in many parts into
INTRODUCTORY .
5
savannas or natural meadows, formerly known as prairies, wet or dry, struck the hardy pioneers as a land made for their happiness, and unhappily, also, as being entirely insufficient for them and the natives both. The dry prairies, such as the Pickaway Plains, were prolific of crops. Wet prairies were found here and there in all parts of the State, but most extensively in the central and northwest quarter. They were luxuriantly clothed in grasses, wild rice, and flowering plants, changing with the seasons, and of gaudiest hues. Clumps and groves of the black-jack were inter- spersed, like islands, through their flat and ocean- like expanse. Beautiful as they were, their fea- tures were often tiresome to the traveler, who, after his day’s journey through the soft mire, fan- cied in looking around that he was just where he had started in the morning. The southeastern quarter of the State, on the contrary, is serrated with hills, and though not so fertile contains hid- den treasures of mineral, which in later days have justified its settlers as wiser than they knew. All parts of the State were peculiarly rich in game. The river, the lake, and the inland com- bined to form a country which the red man and the white alike admired and coveted as a garden of delights. No wonder that the savage died rather than yield it ; no wonder that enterprising spirits in the old settlements were eager to enjoy a land so attractively pictured by all who came back from it ; the more the pity that, between
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OHIO.
these conflicting passions, justice and mercy could not have upheld the pious Moravians in their effort to devise a way for an equal enjoy- ment by both. But as this was not to be, we shall find nature’s bounteous gifts enhanced to the white race by the wisdom of Congress in the first laws which it impressed upon the new soil ; most vital of which was the great ordinance of 1787, and the provision inserted by Mr. Dane, almost fortuitously it seems, at the last moment of its passage, extirpating slavery, already intro- duced by the French, and dedicating the soil to the labor of freemen ; an edict by no means so highly prized among the early settlers as now.
Another measure, which added incalculably to this influence, was the law by which the public lands were sold in small tracts and at low prices by the government directly ; free from the exac- tions of speculators, who might have engrossed all for their own profit. It was, nevertheless, a circumstance of much import that, by the large grants of land previously conceded by the govern- ment to the holders of Virginia military certifi- cates, and to the Ohio and the Miami companies, the first colonization of the State, in different quarters, by bodies of emigrants of several and distinct origins, imparted characteristics and pecu- liarities which even now strongly diversify the people of these different sections.
In less than a century Ohio has become more populous than all the thirteen colonies when they
IN TROD UCTORY .
7
declared independence. Such a growth would be marvelous but for the equal strides with which her sister states of the Northwest Territory are ad- vancing under the same auspices and policy. But what renders the growth of Ohio phenomenal, as compared with these her sister states, is, that for forty years Ohioans have been largely an emi- grating people. Vast numbers of them have, like their fathers, gone farther West for cheaper land and new homes, and Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, and the states on the Pacific contain well-nigh a million of the sons of Ohio or their descendants.
The city population has already outrun the ordinary proportion of the interior states. Be- sides Cincinnati, with an estimated population of 300,000, and Cleveland with its 200,000, there are fifteen cities having more than 10,000 each ; chief of which are Columbus, the capital, Dayton, and Toledo. But the population and wealth of the State are still principally agricultural, and when the public lands shall ultimately be taken up, in the enormous market kept open by the emigrant and naturalization laws, the superior productive- ness of the old territory of the Northwest, as a food-supplier, will probably be found unequalled by any portion of the continent.
The changes wrought upon the face of the country are equally striking. The Indian, not- withstanding the noble effort of the Moravians, has vanished. Not one of his villages is left. The great forests, the beautiful prairies, the flow-
8
OHIO.
ing rivers and their fresh springs, have shrunk away, and the farm, the village, and the city have so far supplanted them that already forestry asso- ciations are anxiously agitating measures to save what is left. Eighty-eight counties, each with its court-house and cluster of local institutions, divide and dot the administrative map of the State. The great national road, earliest link of Ohio with the Atlantic States, and two canals uniting the lakes and the Ohio, invaluable still, though attempts have been made to destroy them, were the early pride of the State. Then came the era of turnpikes, and this in turn was succeeded by the railway system, which, numbering more than a hundred companies, great and small, has rendered every county in the State accessible by rail. Among these railways are links in the vast trans- continental lines; pointing out the narrow belt between the Ohio and Lake Erie, at the Pennsyl- vania line, as the natural passage between the oceans.
The rise of Ohio, in less than a century, from these wilds, will be the subject of the following chapters. They will not form a mere chronicle of the changes which have occurred since the foun- dation of the State ; rather, they are sketches in- terweaving with annals some account of the early combination of emigrants, events and inci- dents, which has led to the development of the State and the traits of its people, as they now present themselves. Such sketches may be com
INTRODUCTORY .
9
nected without being strictly continuous. The de- tails, so abundantly supplied in the many local histories of the State, must necessarily be re- stricted by the proportions of this volume. As a centenary memoir, its purpose is to set forth the foundations of the State rather than its full growth.
CHAPTER II.
THE WILDERNESS.
The dawn of the history of Ohio appears about the middle of the last century. There are stories and traditions, and some imperfect relations of an earlier date, but they are too uncertain to be at all credible as history.
At that period the region now occupied by the State of Ohio, which has become the gateway to the great West, was an almost unbroken wilder- ness, without ruler or law, and tenanted only by the wild beasts or a race of wilder men. It was a vast waste of luxuriant nature, where, amid scenes apparently of primeval solitude, the explorer might have thought that war’s invading foot had never trod. Wild and neglected as these soli- tudes seemed to be, there were visible monuments of a prehistoric age, and also buried relics of ex- tinct races of men and animals. Throughout the eastern valley of the Mississippi, and to some ex- tent west of it, there are huge works of men not only without a history, but of whom the red men first met by the Europeans had neither tradition nor legend. They were dwelling among these ruins without the least curiosity as to their build- ers. The keenest efforts of explorers to penetrate
THE WILDERNESS.
11
their origin and antiquity are still baffled. The most remarkable works of the people known as the “ Mound Builders ” are probably to be found in Ohio ; notably those in or near the valleys of the Miamis, the Scioto, and the Muskingum. It is supposed that ten thousand of them, large and small, are dispersed over the State. It is certain that some of them are not of the prehistoric age. Later races, and to some extent the modern In- dians, have not only utilized the older mounds for burial purposes, but appear to have constructed some for themselves. A difference is observed, also, between the lighter forms of embankment, in the works near Lake Erie, and the heavy and more elevated ramparts in the middle and south- ern parts of Ohio. This has led to the conclusion that the former, which are found also in New York and further east, were the base of stock- ade forts built by the later races. The extensive lines at Newark and Portsmouth, each of which amounts to about fifteen miles of lineal embank- ment, and the heavy works at Fort Ancient, Circleville, Chillicothe, and Marietta, though not so extended as the former, are the most impor- tant. Military men, such as General Wayne and General Harrison, were of opinion, however, that some of these works were built for enclosures rather than as fortifications.
The exploring party of Major Long to the St. Peter’s reported a singular observation that in these ancient fortifications the ditch is found
12
OHIO.
inside of the rampart. They report that their examination of Fort Necessity, the little earth- work thrown up by Major Washington in his first encounter with the French and Indians in 1754, showed this peculiarity, and hence was in- ferred to “ comport better with Indian warfare.” Bishop Madison, a diligent inquirer into these an- cient works, regarded this peculiarity as proving that they were not for military purposes. Colonel Whittlesey, in his survey of the works at New- ark, found a circular embankment twelve feet high, with an interior ditch seven feet in depth. The ditch inside of the parapet, he stated, is not uncommon.
The mounds are the most numerous as well as most promising objects for exploration. It is to their contents, mainly, that researches as to the key or clue to the mysterious builders must be directed ; and they are various, not only in their forms and dimensions, but in the purposes which they are supposed to have served. Some, like those at Cahokia and Grave Creek, are of huge proportions, the former having a base of six acres and height of ninety feet, flattened at the top to a platform of five acres. Some are sepulchres ; others were used for altars or religious rites ; those of a truncated form, or terraces, are sup- posed to have been for residences ; and many are extended on lines, or in an order, indicating that they were connected with defensive works, as advanced posts or signal stations.
THE WILDERNESS.
13
There has been little discrimination in the claims made for the antiquity of all these works, but even as to those agreed to be the most archaic there is much dispute. Judge Force, who has diligently studied the various hypothe- ses, is inclined to consider the lapse of a thousand years sufficient to explain all the possible condi- tions for construction which have been presented. The absence of all history or trace of the people who constructed them he does not regard as sig- nificant, inasmuch as it would be entirely ac- counted for by the successive annihilation of each other by transient tribes or nations sweeping over the continent, and that a few centuries only would suffice for complete obliteration. A sim- ple circumstance referred to by him disposes of the argument drawn from the existence of the aged trees surmounting many of the mounds and embankments. No little hillocks are found at these spots to indicate the uprooting of an older growth of trees prostrated either by storms or the decay of age.
Until recently, the labors of antiquarians had unearthed little save bones and ashes of the dead, flint and stone implements, shells and rude pot- tery, denoting remains of a people superior in some respects, perhaps, to the modern Indian, but not so much advanced as the Mexicans, or even as the Natchez, who are supposed by some to be their relicts. Copper utensils and orna- ments, some of them plated, had also been found,
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OHIO.
and the best of these are said to be in the collec- tion of the Historical Society of Wisconsin.
The recent systematic researches of the Pea- body Museum of Archaeology at Cambridge, Mass., have been rewarded with richer and more important revelations as to the lost race than any which had previously been brought to light. As a result of the explorations by the Museum staff and some local savans , mounds in the northeast part of Hamilton County, near Cincinnati, have been found to contain, besides human remains and implements and pottery of the common sort, a deposit of thousands of small pearl beads, and, what is esteemed of higher significance, “ masses of iron,” manufactured and unmanufactured. This discovery, and the treasure trove thus ex- humed by superior skill under the very eyes of the people of Ohio, and now to be taken away from them, are of sufficient interest to justify a full extract from the report of Mr. Frederick W. Putnam, curator of the Museum : —
“ On the estate of Mr. Michael Turner, in the north- eastern corner of Anderson Township, near the Little Miami River, is a group of earthworks which has proved to be in several respects the most important and interesting of the many which have been investi- gated in Ohio. The whole group embraces thirteen mounds and two earth circles, all of which are enclosed by two circular embankments, one of which is on a hill and is connected with the other by a graded way. Sev- eral of the mounds contained altars or basins of burnt
THE WILDERNESS.
15
clay, on two of which there were literally thousands of objects of interest. Two of these altars, each about four feet square, were cut out and brought to the Mu- seum. Among the objects from the altars are numer- ous ornaments and carvings unlike anything we have had. One altar contained about two bushels of orna- ments made of stone, mica, shells, the canine teeth of bears and other animals, and thousands of pearls. Nearly all these objects are perforated in various ways for suspension. Several of the copper ornaments are covered with native silver, which had been hammered out into thin sheets and folded over the copper. Among these are a bracelet and a bead, and several of the spool-shaped objects which, from discoveries made in other mounds of this group, I now regard as ear or- naments. One small copper pendant seems to have been covered with a thin sheet of gold, a portion of which still adheres to the copper, while other bits of it were found in the mass of materials. This is the first time that native gold has been found in the mounds, although hundreds have been explored, and the small amount found here shows that its use was exceptional. The ornaments cut out of copper and mica are very in- teresting and embrace many forms : among them is a grotesque human profile cut out of a sheet of mica. Several ornaments of this material resemble the heads of animals, whose features are emphasized by a red color, while others are in the forms of circles and bands. Many of the copper ornaments are large and of peculiar shape; others are scrolls, scalloped circles, oval pendants, and other forms. There are about thirty of the singular spool-shaped objects or earrings made of copper, like the two described in the last re-
16
OHIO.
port. Three large sheets of mica were on this altar, and several finely chipped points of obsidian, chalce- dony, and chert were in the mass of materials. Sev- eral pendants cut from micaceous schist are of a unique style of work. There are also portions of a circular piece of bone, over the surface of which are incised fig- ures, and flat pieces of shell similarly carved. Several masses of native copper were on the altar.
“ But by far the most important things found on thh altar were the several masses of meteoric iron and the ornaments made from this metal. One of these is half of a spool-shaped object or ear ornament, like those made of copper with which it was associated. Another ear ornament of copper is covered with a thin plating of the iron, in the same manner as others were cov- ered with silver. There is also a folded and corru- gated band of iron, of the same shape and of about the same size as the band of copper found in a mound in Tennessee, and figured in the last report. Three of the masses of iron have been more or less hammered into bars, as if for the purpose of making some orna- ment or implement, and another is apparently in the natural shape in which it was found. As all these iron masses were exposed to great heat on the altar, they have become more or less oxidized ; and two of them were so much changed in external character that sev- eral good mineralogists, as well as myself, mistook them for limonite, or bog iron, which had probably formed since the mound was erected. The discov- ery of iron in the mound was of course a matter of great interest, from whichever side it was viewed, and it was therefore a matter of the first importance that its character should be accurately determined. For this
THE WILDERNESS.
17
purpose I have been fortunate in securing the coop- eration of Dr. L. P. Kinnicutt, assistant in chemistry in Harvard College, who has become much interested in the work, and has made careful analyses of all the masses and objects of iron. Dr. Kinnicutt has found that each and all contained nickel, and that all the iron is unquestionably meteoric. As this is the first time that objects made of meteoric iron have been deter- mined from the mounds, it is of great interest, and it will now be necessary to examine anew the statements made by Hildreth and Atwater in relation to the traces of iron which they found in mounds in Ohio over sixty years ago.
u It is worth recapitulating here that native gold, sil- ver, copper, and iron were all found on the altar of the large mound in this group, and that all were manufac- tured into ornaments simply by hammering. A mass of lead ore, galena, was found in another mound of this group. On another altar, in another mound of the group, were several terra-cotta figures of a character heretofore unknown from the mounds/’
This discovery suggests possibilities which may prove marvelous. The prodigious number of pearls found in this tomb, the tomb probably of some grandee, would be incredible were it not that larger and finer specimens have been taken from the Little Miami River. But vastly larger num- bers were plundered by De Soto from the graves at Cutifachiqui (Savannah river), said by the Gentleman of Elvas, a veracious man, to have amounted to “ fourteen arrobas (three hundred and ninety-two pounds), and little babies and
18
OHIO.
birds made of them,” a point which may have some bearing upon the Peabody discovery. The pertinent question, however, is not so much as to the numbers, but how the perforation of the beads was accomplished. Were the lapidaries, whose wheels and drills did such cunning work, of the same race as the builders of the mounds ?
Whence or whither these people proceeded is an unsolved problem. From the concentration of the heavier and apparently more military works in southwestern Ohio, we can conceive that here they finally encountered the foe, equally obscure, who overwhelmed them. Ex- termination seems to have overtaken both alike. The subject admits of such an infinite deal of conjecture and credulity, that for the present it must be relegated to a place with the unknown status of the “Ice Sheet” and “Boulder” pe- riods in Ohio history.
Still another mystery of the wilderness re- mains in the traces of the huge beast described by Cuvier as the Mastodon giganteus , and by Buff on as the Mastodon Ohioticus , though desig- nated also by the latter as of the mammoth spe- cies. The most noted trace of this creature is at Big Bone Lick, a salt lick or spring in Kentucky, situated near the Ohio River, and about twenty-six miles below the Big Miami. The great deposit of bones found imbedded in the mud at this spot suggests that it may have been the meeting-place for terrific battles as well as refreshment, though
THE WILDERNESS .
19
possibly these are remains of the sick rather than of the vanquished. Explorations and removal of the bones preserved in this mineral soil were made at an early period. Longueil, the French commander at Detroit, sent one of the tusks to Paris in 1739. Captain Gist, in his exploration of Ohio in the winter of 1750-51, obtained two jaw-teeth, each more than four pounds in weight, and like fine ivory when cleaned. Robert Smith, a trader with whom he lodged at the Tawighti fort (Piqua), had found them seven years pre- viously at Big Bone Lick, and assured Gist that the rib -bones of the largest of these animals whose remains he found there were eleven feet in length, and the skull six feet in breadth across the eye sockets. Several of the horns, as he styled the tusks, were more than five feet in length and as much as a man could carry. The French Indians, he reported, had taken away many of these remains. George Croghan, the Western deputy of Sir William Johnson, and also Captains Hutchins and Gordon of the British army, distinguished as Western geographers, all visited the place before the revolutionary war, and from their reports and specimens the scientific men of Europe derived their principal information.
The immense proportions of the skull described by Smith to Gist are confirmed by the size of tusks found elsewhere, and much larger than those which he has reported. Several have been un- earthed in the deep gravel bed on which part of
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OBiO.
the city of Cincinnati is built. The largest was exposed in excavating this bank for the building of a public school house, on the north side of Third Street, between Elm and Plum streets. It was ivory-like, slightly curving towards a point, and almost perfect as it lay horizontally in the gravel, about twelve feet below the surface. Both ends were worn off by percolation. What re- mained was fully seven feet in length, and the lines, if produced, would have extended it to nine feet. Being saturated with water, and unskill- fully handled, this rare and valuable specimen fell to pieces before getting into proper hands.
Descending to the times when the history of Ohio begins to emerge, in a fragmentary way, it would seem that late in the seventeenth century, or early in the eighteenth, the Indian tribes had become distributed through the country now com- prised in Ohio in about the following ranges: The part east of the Muskingum, together with the country on the upper Ohio and Alleghany rivers, was held by the Mingoes (Senecas). The Wyandots (Hurons), after being driven from the St. Lawrence across upper Canada to the north- west and then back again, had seated themselves opposite Detroit, but a large body of them had also taken their abode on the Sandusky River, ex- tending as far as the Scioto ; and at the time of Gist’s tour had their chief village on the Tusca- rawas, near its junction with the Wahlhonding. Certain clans of the Miamis, known then as the
THE WILDERNESS.
21
Twightwees (Tawightis or Tawixtis), probably Piankeshaws and Ouiatanons (Weas), extended across from the Wabash to the upper valleys of the Big and Little Miami rivers, having a fort and large town on or near the present site of Piqua. The Shawanees were on the Ohio, Muskingum, and Scioto, their chief town being on both sides of the Ohio, at the mouth of the Scioto. The Delawares at this time were scattered among the Mingoes, Shawanees, and Wyandots. There were Kicka- poos, and bands of Northwestern Indians, Potta- watomies, Ottawas, and Chippewas in villages on the Maumee. There were also small detached bands or villages of Cherokees and Caughnawagas ; the former in Ross County, the latter in the West- ern Reserve.
These were the local tribes, but none of them were indigenous. There was a theory, presently to be explained, that all of them were admitted to this region by permission of the Five Nations. The latter had not yet become Six Nations ; the Tus- caroras not being incorporated with them until about the year 1713. The Mingoes were not a nation, but refractory wanderers or outlaws of the Five Nations, chiefly Senecas and Cayugas ; the Senecas being the western flank of the Five Na- tions, and extending from the Genesee to the Alleghany River. These borderers became known as the Mingoes ; a name of bad repute, as readers of the Leather Stocking tales will remember, and derived from Mengwe, an appellation given by
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OHIO.
the Dutch to the Mohawks or Maquas, and col- lectively to the entire confederation. Soon after Gist’s tour, the Wyandots withdrew from the Muskingum in favor of their grandfathers, the Delawares. These were to have been blessed, in their new home, by the civilizing power of the Moravians, had fate so permitted it to be. The Shawanees, in like manner, were let into the upper valley of the Scioto, and thus around to its head- waters and the beautiful plains between these and the upper branches of the Little Miami.
Prior to the period of this occupation, it is to be gathered from the French relations that two powerful nations, the Eries (or Chats, as styled by the French) and the Andastes, held the entire country south and west of the Five Nations ; ex- tending on Lake Erie from the Sandusky east- ward to the mountains, and perhaps to the Sus- quehanna. Between them and the Five Nations long and bloody wars were kept up with varying issues ; the latter at one time, it would seem, being nearly overcome. But it is all vague. The only authentic fact known is the statement of Father Lemoine, that the Iroquois (Five Nations), at his “council of peace” with them in August, 1654, were in deep lamentation over the death of their great chief Anencraos, who had been taken prisoner in the new war they were then waging against the Cat Nation. About the year 1660 it is supposed the Five Nations, by a rapid invasion, surprised and drove the Eries into their fortifica-
THE WILDERNESS .
23
tions, somewhere in northeastern Ohio or Pennsyl- vania, and carrying it by storm exterminated the warriors, and, in the happy manner which they had of reinforcing themselves, took off and adopted the women and children into their own tribes. The Andastes, who are supposed to have occupied western Pennsylvania, were conquered and dis- posed of not long afterwards in like manner. This dominion of the Five Nations, of whom the Senecas were the most numerous, now became extended down the Alleghany and Ohio rivers to the Muskingum, actually and beyond dispute.
This deadly war, and its consequences, acquired an important bearing upon the subsequent dis- putes as to which of the European powers had rightful dominion of the country out of which Ohio was formed. Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, the English cabinet awoke to the importance of the trans-Alleghany region, and the advantage which the French had been quietly gaining by their rapid process of preoccupation. It suited their purpose, therefore, taking counsel from Sir William Johnson and Governor Pownall, two of the most intelligent and vigorous of their colonial agents, to set up the claim that the Iro- quois, or Five Nations, were the conquerors and masters of the country north of the Ohio as far west as the Mississippi ; and as these conquerors had acknowledged themselves subjects of Great Britain, and were expressly recognized as such by France in the 15th Article of the Treaty of
24
OHIO.
Utrecht (1713), that power had an actual para- mount title and possession which defeated all the pretensions which France had set up through her little colonies and trading-posts at the West. Upon the question there was a long diplomatic contention, theory against fact, in which neither party would yield. On this side of the Atlantic, Governors Pownall, Colden, and DeWitt Clinton strenuously maintained the New York or English claim, but were ably controverted by General Harrison, Dr. Daniel Drake, and half and half by Butler in his u History of Kentucky.” Finally the question was renewed in Congress when the ces- sion by New York was asserted to have given the United States a title in the Northwest Territory superior to the claim of Virginia. This obdurate dispute, although put an end to by the cession made by Virginia, has an historical interest, if nothing more, of some concern to Ohio.
It is to be observed that none of the tribes occupying the Ohio country in the last century, nbt even the Mingoes, conceded the claim thus set up by England on the ground of the Iroquois con- quest. This presents a puzzle which I propose to examine in a further chapter. The unhappy con- sequences of the treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1768 sufficiently attest this. The defiant claim of the tribes from that time was, that the land was theirs, not by permission of the Five Nations, nor by that of the whites under their imaginary dominion by discovery, — a title always incompre-
THE WILDERNESS.
25
hensible to the Indians. They were the foes who for nearly thirty years barred the Ohio River by an unrelenting and bloody war upon the pioneers of Kentucky and the Northwest. This barrier neither treaty nor force could remove until it was swept away by General Wayne and his irresistible legion.
Numbers of white people, it must be noted, had early in the century, and long before this out- break, become dispersed among the Ohio tribes in various ways and with diverse fortunes. First of all were the French traders, the coureurs des hois , the stragglers and deserters who drifted on the Maumee, the Sandusky, and perhaps the Cuya- hoga. They left no annals nor trace, unless it be the axe-marks upon trees, or the rusty relics of guns and skillets, which occasionally puzzle the antiquarians on the lake shore. There were many refugees also who had left the settlements under a cloud, and some of these renegades became the most ferocious enemies of the early settlers. More than all were the captives, white and black, who had been spared from the stake and adopted as members of the tribes. Two of these are especially known, — the “ white woman ” after whom the Wahlhonding originally was named ; and Colonel James Smith. The former is intro- duced to us by Captain Gist as Mary Harris, cap- tured in New England, when a child, by the French Indians, and with her Indian husband and children brought in their migrations to the
26
OHIO .
West. 44 She remembers,” says Gist, “ they used to be very religious in New England, and wonders how the white men can be so wicked as she has seen them in these woods.” Colonel Smith was captured in boyhood, near Fort Duquesne, and brought up among the Indians in northern Ohio. His account of his captivity and life among them, their customs, manners, and character, is probably the most truthful, intelligent, and in- teresting narrative ever written on the subject. It is an admirable picture of the Indian at home, or in repose.
In the curious fusion of the whites with the Indians which was going on at this early period, there were hermits also ; people who sought the wilderness for quiet or seclusion. They were not only unmolested, but were treated by the red men with superstitious regard. A wandering, kindly specimen of this sort was John Chapman, or Johnny Appleseed, as the early settlers named him, who came to the Muskingum late in the last century, and spent his time chiefly in scattering nurseries of apple-trees about the country for the benefit of the coming people. Indians and whites equally respected his quaint, inoffensive life and ways. With nothing but his axe and bag of apple- seed, or sometimes, as the settlements grew, a few Swedenborgian tracts, he made his pilgrimages far into the wilderness, where he cleared or dead- ened spots in the woods, in which he sowed his seed, and surrounding them with hedges of brush,
THE WILDERNESS .
27
to keep off the deer, left them as gifts to those who should follow. Many an orchard far out in the Firelands, and at the heads of the Scioto, the Miamis, and the Wabash, was planted from these seedlings.
Two interpolations, apparently, have worked themselves into current histories of the early In- dian age for which it is difficult to find any origi- nal authority. One relates to a victory supposed to have been gained by the Iroquois, in a great battle fought in canoes on Lake Erie, over the Hu- rons, according to one theory, but by another over the Miamis. The other of these apocryphal re- ports represents the Shawanees as having been originally occupants of the country on Lake Erie, and driven thence by the Iroquois in the sixteenth century. That was the period, according to the French relations , when the Eries, or Chats, occu- pied the country and were exterminated by the Iroquois. The Shawanees claimed, moreover, to be a southern people, and certainly had strong marks of such on origin. At the time when they are thus supposed to have been driven from Lake Erie, they were slowly moving northward from Georgia or Florida. One body of them was found by La Salle in 1682 on the Wabash; another, about the same time, was inhabiting the lower country between the Delaware and Susquehanna, and was supposed to have come northward along the east side of the Alleghany Mountains. But, recurring to the western migration of the whites, it
28
OHIO .
will probably be found that it was much ante- rior to the period which is usually reckoned in our histories. The “ first-born white child ” was much earlier and more numerous in Ohio than the antiquarians and centennial orators allow.
CHAPTER III.
UNDER WHICH KING?
In the days of its subjection to European sover- eignty, Ohio formed but an indistinct part of the trans- Alleghany wilds, which for a century were assumed by England, France, and Spain each as belonging to their dominion.
According to our historians and jurists, all English proprietorship in America is traced so implicitly to those famous and inexpensive char- ters which the kings of England, in the seven- teenth century, lavished upon their courtiers and other loving subjects, that it seems profane to doubt them. But the charters themselves, like the elephants which in the ancient cosmogony upheld the corners of the world, require some sup- port. And it may be seriously doubted whether an altogether undue importance has not been given to the British claim of dominion over North America through the discovery by the Cabots. It has been wrapped in chapters of verbiage, but the whole story, or the kernel of it, is contained in a single passage from Ramusio, in which Se- bastian Cabot is introduced as saying that having been stopped by an “ island, and not thinking to
30
OHIO.
find any other land than that of Cathay, and from thence a way to India, I sailed on to the north, to see if I could find any gulf turning in that direc- tion.” Then follows the discovery.
“ Sailing along the coast, I found the land still continent to the fifty-sixth degree under our pole. And seeing that there the coast turned toward the east, despairing to find the passage, I turned back again and sailed down by the coast of that land to- ward the equinoctial (ever with intent to find the said passage to India), and came to that part of this firm land which is now called Florida, where my victuals failing I departed from thence and returned into England, where I found great tumult among the people, and preparation for the wars in Scotland, by reason whereof there was no more consideration had to this voyage.” 1
It is surprising that the “ gift of a continent ” should have rested upon a foundation so weak and slender. The United States might assert a far more plausible sovereignty over the “ Antarctic continent ” which was discovered in 1840 by the exploring expedition under Commodore Wilkes. Eighty years elapsed before Queen Elizabeth’s patents were issued to Gilbert and Raleigh, of which nothing survived but the name of Virginia, and the introduction of tobacco into England. No possession of the English was established until the charter of King James which was granted in 1606 to the London and Plymouth companies, and was followed in 1609 by the great patent under which the region northwest of the Ohio River was as- sumed to be within the chartered limits of Vir- ginia. This was taken to be accomplished by its 1 Biddle’s Memoir.
UNDER WHICH KING?
31
boundary on the Atlantic, “ and thence extending from the seacoast of the precinct aforesaid up into the land throughout, from sea to sea, west and northwest.”
How little the king and the crown officers knew of the land which they were pretending to parcel out, appears not only from the vague and senseless boundaries thus prescribed, but even more from the fact that Captain John Smith, with all his geographic lore, went up the Chickahominy to find this western sea, and that so intelligent a man as Governor Spotswood, a century later, fancied that he had descried the Ohio River from the summit of the Blue Ridge.
These circumstances indicate how blindly Eng- land and her colonists were groping their way into the back country, which, before their eyes were opened, other nations and more searching and active adventurers had explored, and to a large extent appropriated its possession and en- joyment.
The charters, however, though they could not grant what the king did not possess, had this vir- tue : they were a license to explore, and gave title to the discoveries made, so far as occupied, but no more. Tried by this principle, neither Great Britain nor her colonies had, in the seventeenth century, acquired any pretensions northwest of the Ohio River by right of discovery or by char- ter. In the next century her statesmen con- structed another title through what was denom- inated the Iroquois Conquest.
32
OHIO.
De Soto, though not the discoverer of the Mississippi, was the first of the Spanish captains who acquired a hold upon it. Starting from Tampa with six hundred and twenty men, he had been marching and counter-marching two years through the country, northward and westward, when in April, 1541, he suddenly came upon the great river, somewhere, probably, near Helena. He crossed, and after marching another year through Arkansas or southern Missouri, fighting incessant and inhuman battles with the Indians, and struggling against climate, swamps, starva- tion, and disease, with a fortitude almost super- human, he was driven back to the river. Crippled as he was, he might have made himself master of the Mississippi. Had he but known his opportu- nity, Spain would have gained the prize which two centuries later she coveted in vain. But over- come with hardships, and in a fever of remorse for the peril into which he had drawn his men, he died there. Wrapped in a winding-sheet filled with sand, his body was sunk in the Mississippi at night, to conceal from the savages that the “ Child of the Sun ” was mortal. It was fitting that the monster river, which might have been his glory, should thus swallow up the man who had contemned its power. So ended the only ef- fort of Spain in that century on the Mississippi.
To finish at once with her subsequent preten- sions, when Spain acquired the territory west of the Mississippi by gift from France in 1763, she
UNDER WHICH KING?
33
kept a jealous eye thenceforward upon the east- ern valley. She most ungenerously demanded, as a condition of joining the alliance with France to support the war for American independence, that the United States should renounce any at- tempt to acquire the Mississippi, or the territory west of the Alleghany Mountains. Foiled in this, she sent an expedition in 1781 from St. Louis, which captured the little British fort at the mouth of the river St. Joseph’s, in Michigan. In the negotiations at Paris in August, 1782, for the treaty of peace and independence, the Count D’ Aranda, on the part of Spain, objected to the demand of the United States for the boundary of the Mississippi. He asserted that, by the con- quest of West Florida and the British posts on the lower Mississippi and in Illinois (St. Joseph’s), the river had passed to the Spanish arms. He then proposed a line from Florida to the mouth of the Kanawha River, thence to extend across Ohio to the west end of Lake Erie and up the lakes to the head of the Mississippi, as the western limit of the United States.
This critical negotiation, and the skillful man- ner in which the duplicity of the Spanish and French ministers was baffled by Messrs. Jay, Adams, and Franklin, need not be recounted. It is enough to say that the St. Joseph’s was the nearest approach made by Spain to Ohio.
Far to the north, long before the commissions even of Gilbert and Raleigh were issued, the
34
OHIO.
French had penetrated the continent by way of the St. Lawrence. Cartier had sailed up to Ho- chelaga (Montreal) in 1534-35. De Monts, under a patent from Henry IV. in 1604, the first grant of American soil ever made, extending from the 40th to the 46th degree of north latitude, had settled Port Royal, now Annapolis, in Acadie. Champlain in 1608, acting for De Monts, founded and fortified Quebec, and soon afterwards was appointed vice-governor of the province of New France, the territory of which extended indefi- nitely up the St. Lawrence.
Here the way was traced which first led to Ohio. This faithful and untiring servant of the king, by his administration of thirty years, richly earned his title of the “Father of Canada.” But unhappily for France, his first step was an error, which ultimately involved the loss of the French dominion in America. Finding his neighbors, the Hurons and the Algonquins, embroiled in war with the Iroquois or Five Nations, the powerful confederacy stretching from Lake Champlain to the Niagara River, he with a few of his musket- eers accompanied the Hurons two successive years in raids up the Sorel and the shores of Lake Champlain. In these battles the Iroquois were dismayed and routed by the firearms now encoun- tered by them for the first time. Numbers of them were slain or made prisoners and tortured by the exultant Hurons, in revenge for the cruel- ties long wreaked upon them by the ferocious
UNDER WHICH KING ?
35
Iroquois. The latter cared little for the warriors lost, but these defeats were a blow to their prowess which they never forgave nor forgot. The deadly hostility thus engendered against the French ren- dered the Iroquois not only the allies and strong defense of the Dutch and afterwards the English of New York in the French and Indian wars, but, what is more to the present subject, they became an insuperable barrier between the French and the valley of the Ohio. In these wars, it may be mentioned in passing, they drove the Hurons from their country between the St. Lawrence and Lake Huron to the wilds beyond the northern lakes. Here again the Hurons were driven back by the fierce tribes of Sioux to the shores of Lake St. Clair and the Detroit River. Thence a large body of them who became hostile to the French migrated early in the last century to Ohio. From their original name of Wendats they became bet- ter known as the Wyandots.
For sixty years the French were shut off from the upper St. Lawrence and the Lakes Ontario and Erie by the incessant assaults of the Iroquois, their communication with the Northwest being restricted to the route by the Ottawa and Macki- nac. The first glimpse which we get of the coun- try south of Lake Erie is from the relation of a mission in 1654 by Fathers Dablon, Le Moine, and Chaumont among the Senecas^ the most west- erly of the Five Nations. At a u Council of Peace ” held by Le Moine, the warriors were
36
OHIO.
mourning and he “ wiped away their tears ” for the loss of Annencroas, a great chief, in a war then raging between the Iroquois and the Eries or Chats, a nation occupying the country south of Lake Erie. Probably this fixes the period of the final struggle in which the Eries are supposed to have been exterminated, and the country between that lake and the Ohio River utterly depopulated and laid waste. As an incident in this mythic age of Ohio, we learn that the Eries were called Chats by the French, from wearing coon-skins, the raccoon being taken by the French for cats. This animal abounded on the shores and islands of Lake Erie.
Soon after the conquest of the Eries, the Iro- quois suffered a terrible check from an invasion by the Marquis de Tracy and a large body of French regular and colonial troops. Their coun- try was overrun, their towns were burned, and terms dictated by which the confederacy for a time was completely humbled.
At this time appeared the celebrated Robert Cavelier, better known as the Sieur de La Salle, who was to be the chief factor in opening and extending the French dominion over the lower lakes and the valley of the Mississippi. It were worth a chapter to follow his wonderful career, but a few incidents only can be referred to in con- nection with our subject.
In intercourse with the Senecas as a fur-trader, he heard of a river beyond their country (west-
UNDER WHICH KING?
37
ern New York) which they called the Hohio. “ Following it seven or eight months,” they told him, “ one would come where the land was cut off,” meaning that it fell into the sea. This to La Salle’s ardent disposition meant the Vermilion Sea, and at once the way to China and Cathay flashed upon him and became the engrossing theme of his speculation. The Sulpitian fathers, Dollier and Galinee, were just starting upon a mission to the Ottawas. La Salle obtained leave to accompany them, and they consented to his re- quest to go by the south shore of Lake Ontario, hoping that the Senecas would guide them to the Ohio. The wily Iroquois disappointed them, but the Indians at the west end of Lake Ontario were more ready. To their astonishment, at Grand River, on their way across to Lake Erie, they met with Joliet, the famous explorer, who, with Father Marqette, four years later discovered the upper Mississippi. He was now returning from the west by way of Lake Erie, being the first white traveler on its waters. This meeting resulted in the separation of the Sulpitians from La Salle, Joliet advising them that the spiritual wants of the Ottawas were a more proper object for them than the exploration of the Ohio. La Salle, dis- comfited and sick, returned as was supposed to La Chine, the name which the Montreal wits had derisively given to his establishment. The first effort for the discovery of the Ohio therefore failed. The rebuff of La Salle was followed by
38
OHIO.
his disappearance, or rather by a blank in his history for the next four years. It has been in- geniously surmised that he spent this interval in an expedition to the Ohio ; and two anonymous memoirs recently found by M. Margry in the archives of the Department of the Marine and Colonies at Paris, which are published in his re- cent compilation of historical documents, support this theory. But whether La Salle ever explored or even visited the Ohio River is left in as much doubt as ever. His casual allusions to the Ohio, which these writers relate, rather tend to the con- trary. The very fact that no report from La Salle himself of his discovery or descent of the Ohio has yet come to light, must be regarded as strong evidence that he was never there.
Two years later we find in the history of Vir- ginia a similar failure of the English in approach- ing the Ohio. Captain Thomas Batts, with a party of English and Indians, was sent by Gov- ernor Berkeley in September, 1671, “ to explore and find out the ebbing and flowing of the water behind the mountains, in order to the discovery of the South Sea.” After a march of thirteen days from “ Appomatok” through the forests and over steep mountains, they came down upon waters run- ning west of northwest through pleasant hills and rich meadows. They encountered a river “ like the Thames at Chelsea,” and following its course came, on the sixteenth day, to “ a fall that made a great noise,” probably the Falls of Kanawha.
UNDER WHICH KING ?
39
Here the journey ended, the Indians refusing to go further, under the pretense that they could catch no game on account of the dryness of the ground and the sticks ; but really from dread of the tribes down that river, from whom, as they reported, travelers never returned. In the coun- try below, they also reported, there was a great abundance of salt. His escort being unmanage- able, Captain Batts was compelled to return. La Salle with such an opportunity would soon have found the Ohio River.
Ohio seemed unapproachable, and so far as can be inferred from its surroundings was, for the last forty years of the seventeenth century, a depopu- lated waste. The Five Nations, after overcoming the Eries, had carried their wars westward, scat- tering the smaller tribes and driving the Illinois Indians, as well as the Miamis and Shawanees, beyond the Mississippi. Flushed with these tri- umphs, they turned back upon the Andastes, in Pennsylvania, and about 1676 had extirpated them, destroying the warriors and amalgamating the women and children with their own people.
But during this contest it would seem the Mi- amis, Shawanees, and Illinois tribes were ventur- ing back to their former positions. The Five Nations nevertheless boasted themselves the con- querors and masters of the West as far as the Mississippi, and by their victories over the Cataw- bas and Cherokees asserted a conquest also of Kentucky and West Virginia.
40
OHIO.
This summary will explain the politico-historical controversy referred to in a former chapter. Gov- ernors Pownall, Colden, and De Witt Clinton, also Sir William Johnson and Doctor Franklin, regarded the rights of the Five Nations to all the hunting grounds of the Ohio valley “ as fairly es- tablished by their conquest in subduing the Shawa- nees, Delawares, Twightwees (Miamis), and Illi- nois, as they stood possessed thereof at the peace of Ryswick in 1697.” General Harrison, on the contrary, in a discourse before the Historical Society of Ohio in 1839, took issue with these dis- tinguished authorities. Relying upon his long intercourse and acquaintance with the Miamis and Shawanees, it was his conclusion, reviewing the whole mass of proof, that, without any rea- sonable doubt, “ the pretensions of the Five Na- tions to a conquest of the country from the Scioto to the Mississippi are entirely groundless.”
This conclusion was mainly based upon the immemorial possession by the Miamis, as General Harrison conceived, of the country where he found them, extending from the Wabash to the Scioto. But a mine of information, since devel- oped by the historical documents published under the auspices of the State of New York and by M. Margry, now proves a misapprehension as to the real history of the Iroquois conquest, on both sides, in this discussion.
There was a conquest extending to the Missis- sippi, but it appears that about the close of the
UNDER WHICH KINGf
41
seventeenth century there was a total reversal, and that the Iroquois were driven back to their original confines by a combination of the Illinois tribes with the Miamis, the Shawanees, and other nations of the Northwest, effected by La Salle and his brave lieutenant, Tonti. La Salle was permitted by his allies to erect a fort far up the Illinois River in the winter of 1682-8B, behind which the confederated tribes were rallied. At this the Iroquois took offense, and in March, 1684, during the absence of La Salle in France, again burst in fury upon the Illinois. They as- saulted the fort (St. Louis) three times, but were repulsed. After a siege of six days they re- treated, pursued by the Miamis and their confed- erates.
It was the first check they had suffered, and proved their last appearance in Illinois. Their expeditions westward fell back year by year. The Miamis and the Shawanees, as well as the Ottawas and Pottawatomies, steadily gained upon them and moved their villages eastward, till the hatchet was buried finally at the great assem- bly of Indian nations gathered by De Callieres in 1701 at Montreal. From that time the Five Nations, potentially, lost their hold of the coun- try west of the Muskingum. The Miamis and the Shawanees had already advanced into Ohio from their original country between Lake Michi- gan and the Wabash.
But just as the power of the Iroquois was wan-
42
OHIO.
ing the hand of England began to be shown. Colonel Thomas Dongan was the first of the pro- vincial governors who pursued an aggressive pol- icy against the French at the West, and really originated the pretension, afterward so boldly pressed by the English, that their sovereignty and title extended wherever the Five Nations had carried their conquests. Though he was a Roman Catholic, he prohibited the French mis- sionaries from residing among the Five Nations, to stop their intrigues. He brought matters to an issue by encouraging the New York traders to insist upon the right of trading up the great lakes, where for more than twenty years the French monopoly had been undisputed.
In the summer of 1686 the traders made the experiment, with good fortune, reaching Mack- inac while Durantaye, the commandant, and his garrison were absent on a military expedition. Their cheap goods and large stock of rum capti- vated the Chippewas so that they swept the mar- ket of its furs, and retired before Durantaye ap- peared. This lucky venture turned the heads of the New Yorkers, and a still larger convoy started the next year under the governor’s pat- ronage, Major Patrick McGregor and a party of soldiers being sent as a guard. The boats passed up Lake Erie, divided into two flotillas, a week or two apart.
But the French had been aroused by the sub- reptive performance of the year before, and also
UNDER WHICH KING ?
43
by another raid threatened by the Iroquois at the west. Early in the year Denonville, the governor- general, had issued orders to Duran taye, Tonti, and Du Luht, commanding the western tribes, to concentrate their warriors at the Niagara River in July, and join him and the French troops from the St. Lawrence in a sweeping invasion of the Five Nations. In this movement Tonti and his Illinois force, as the right wing, were to have passed up the Ohio River and attack the Senecas in the rear. Before they got into motion the ap- proach of six hundred Senecas was reported, and the Illinois refused to leave their fort and vil- lages. The Senecas, equally alarmed by their dis- covery of Denonville’s plan, also fell back.
Denonville’s campaign was successful. But Tonti, when he found that his force was unequal to the part assigned to him, marched directly to the Detroit, to unite with Durantaye and Du Luht at the. post which the latter had established at the head of the straits. In this way Major Mc- Gregor and both his flotillas fell into the hands of the French, one being captured by Durantaye, a little below Mackinac, and the other intercepted by Tonti at or near the west end of Lake Erie. McGregor and his men were taken to Denon- ville as prisoners, the traders and their cargoes delivered over to the Indians for plunder.
This was the first collision of forces between the French and the English at the west, and for the time was fatal to the pretensions of Great
44
OHIO.
Britain in that quarter. This, followed by the assembly and general pacification of the Indian nations by De Callieres at Montreal, and the con- solidation of the French power on the Mississippi, Ohio, and Wabash rivers effected by D’Iberville, Bienville, and Tonti, gave to France at the close of the seventeenth century the mastery and ex- clusive sovereignty of the whole country watered by these rivers and the lakes of the north.
The position of Ohio in this course of events is obscure, for the reason already indicated. For forty years or more, darkness visible hung over the beautiful region lying fallow between the lake and the Ohio. The most that can be gleaned from relations and documents thus far disclosed is, that about the beginning of the eighteenth century the French traders and cou- reurs de hois were pitching their habitations along the south shore of Lake Erie and up the valleys of the Sandusky and Maumee, on their way to the Wabash ; but apparently there was no French settlement, mission, or post formed within the bor- ders of Ohio. The post of which Courtmanche was put in command by Frontenac in 1691 was not at Fort Wayne, but at the mouth of the St. Joseph’s, where the French endeavored to confine the Miamis. Except Du Luht’s post at the head of the Detroit, there was no establishment in or near Ohio until Fort Pontchartrain and the col- ony at Detroit were founded by De Callieres, in spite of the displeasure of the Five Nations and
UNDER WHICH KING ?
45
the English, and built by Cadillac in 1701 by his order. The Maumee, the Sandusky, and the territory down to the Ohio thenceforward became dependencies of this centre.
This aggressive step of the French in fortifying the Detroit, and subordinating all the country south of that post, moved the Five Nations in alarm to surrender to the English the title which they claimed to the western country. Nanfan, the governor of New York, and Robert Living- ston, the secretary, after a week’s conference with the sachems at Albany, obtained a deed of ces- sion July 19, 1701, by the Five Nations to the king, transferring to him as their defender and protector all the beaver - hunting lands at the West, described as having been conquered by them eighty years previously, commencing north of Lake Ontario and extending to the Twight- wees and Quadoge, about eight hundred miles by four hundred in extent. In 1726 this was con- firmed by a second deed, which included their country in New York.
But, nevertheless, it was under French protec- tion and authority, and not by any permission or favor of the Five Nations, as they and the Eng- lish were persistent in assuming, that the Wyan- dots, Miamis, Shawanees of the Wabash, and the Ottawas first entered and occupied the territory which now composes Ohio. These tribes were then under French allegiance, though some, the Miamis especially, were held by a very uncer- tain tenure.
CHAPTER IV.
THE BRITISH CONQUEST.
The defeat of Governor Dongan’s project for extending British dominion and commerce into the country bordering on the upper lakes, forced the English to look for some other avenue to the profitable trade so much coveted, and from which the French were so determined to shut them out. Unless it were by the canoe fleets in 1686 and 1687, which probably went up the usual Iroquois route by the south shore of Lake Erie, no Englishman had yet set foot in Ohio.
The first white population, and the first Euro- pean rule in Ohio, must have been French. Who the inhabitants were, when they came, or where they lived, it would be difficult to discover. Cadillac’s fort and settlement at Detroit had su- perseded Mackinac politically, and was now the central point of authority for Ohio and the route from Canada to Louisiana. Most of the Hurons and many Miamis and Ottawas were gathered near Detroit, in separate villages, on both sides of the river. Next west was the fort of the Mi- amis, established by La Salle at the St. Joseph’s. An important post was soon formed at the head of the Maumee, the confluence of the St. Mary’s
THE BRITISH CONQUEST.
47
and another river St. Joseph’s, (now Fort Wayne.) Between this post and Little River, one of the heads of the Wabash, was the great portage (eight miles) of the canoe traffic between the East and the West.
This line of communication had become so well established, that in 1718 Governor Spotswood, in a despatch to the Board of Trade, could state the itinerary or distances between Montreal and the Mississippi by this route of the Mic and the Occabacke, as he styled the Maumee and Wa- bash. All along this line the French immi- grants colonized in their peculiar fashion. First to come, generally, were those nondescripts, the coureurs des bois (bush-rangers or moonshiners), who have left a scanty and unflattering record.1 They were a mixture of the smuggler and trap- per; deemed outlaws because they would not purchase licenses under the rigid monopoly in the fur trade as farmed out in Canada. In this way thousands of Frenchmen disappeared who had been sent over to the colony at much ex- pense; the king and his ministers constantly complaining of the loss of their subjects. Far out in the forests of the West, safe from the king’s reach, they were living with the savages, marrying and hunting, fiddling, drinking and smoking, in entire independence. Of such were many of the earliest settlers of Ohio.
1 The reader will find a fuller account of this class in Indiana (American Commonwealths), chap. 3.
48 onio.
But this loose population was soon driven on- ward by regular traders and officials, and it drifted off to the Wabash, the Kaskaskias, and the Mis- sissippi, where its survivors appear in Judge Hall’s “ Tales of the Border ; ” finally they vanish in the prairies and the mountains of the far West, figur- ing as voyageurs, guides, and mountain-men in all the expeditions, from that of Lewis and Clarke down to those related by Irving.
Their successors, in turn, also passed away. There were posts of the French traders at Cuya- hoga, Sandusky, Maumee, indeed in every part of northern and western Ohio where Indians were most congregated. But there was no French set- tlement of which any trace remains. There was no history, hardly a “ relation” of them, so that only the name survives. The traditions preserved in the “ Firelands Pioneer,” by Root, Lane, and Schuyler, are the most interesting.
The struggle against the English was in vain. Poor and feeble as the colonies planted by Eng- lishmen had been at first, they began now to in- crease in size and to bristle with enterprise. The cheap prices at which the English control of the ocean enabled the English colonists to offer their goods, and their reckless traffic in rum, proved irresistible to the Indians of the West. But the direction from which they emerged and broke through the French lines was wholly unexpected.
Daniel Coxe’s “ Carolana,” and the “ Spotswood Letters ” of still earlier date, show that the pro-
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prietors and the traders of the southern colonies, particularly of Carolina, were much ahead of their northern brethren in traversing the Alleghanies. They must have been trading with the Indians down the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers at the time when La Salle was descending the Mis- sissippi. Oldmixon, the earliest historian of the colonies, was indignant that, when the English thus had that river and its tributaries so near at their back, the French should presume to claim more power or right than they to its navigation, “ whenever they shall have the same desire to it as the French have.” According to Coxe, the Tennessee was the way of the traders and adven- turers of the Carolinas down to the Ohio and Mississippi. D’Iberville sounded the alarm in an elaborate report to the minister of the marine and colonies (Pontchartrain) in January, 1701 ; pointing out the fact that these people were arm- ing the Chicasaws and other tribes in a manner indicating that in thirty or forty years, unless the French king established a stronger power there, the English would be the masters of the whole country between their colonies and the Mississippi, “ one of the most beautiful countries in the World.” In July he urged that a grant of two leagues by six be conceded to Juchereau at the mouth of the Wabash, in order that he might establish his trading post and tannery there, and prevent the English from meeting the coureurs des boh at that point.
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The warning was prophetic, but too late. In January, 1703, he reported to the minister that the English of Carolina and Maryland had an establishment at that place. He made a sugges- tion, which would surely have been a singular one if La Salle had in fact been on the Ohio, that “ it was a favorable time for exploring that river.” It was discovered also, at this time, that some of the Miamis at the St. Joseph’s had been visiting Albany, and were disposed to remove farther from the French by going down to the Wabash. Vin- cennes was sent there in 1704 to restrain them, but did not succeed. Disturbances arose between the Miamis and Ottawas, which Cadillac inflamed by his gross mismanagement, and brought to a climax by attacking the Miamis at St. Joseph’s with a strong force, and destroying their fort. From this time the French lost their control of the Miamis, and by means of this disaffection a large delegation of the tribe were induced by Montour and the Iroquois to meet the British governor, Lord Cornbury, at Albany, and to pledge their people to trade there. The governor reported his success to the Board of Trade as gained chiefly by Montour’s address. This was a Canadian half-breed who had deserted from the French, and was shortly afterward killed for his treachery by order of Joncaire, the most active of the French partisan leaders. His wife and sons figured largely in subsequent history.
In 1719 Vaudreuil, the French governor, dis-
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closed the fact, in a despatch to the minister, that the English had succeeded in drawing the Mia- mis away from St. Joseph’s. He reported that Vincennes, whom he had sent again to regain control over them, had died at their village on the Wabash, and that they now refused to return. In October, 1725, he reported that the English of Carolina had progressed so far up the country that they had stores and houses on Little River (near the portage), and were trading there with the Miamis and other tribes of the upper country. Beauharnois,liis successor, however, as he reported in October, 1731, had arranged with the Shawa- nees lower down on the Wabash, if the English sent horses there loaded with goods, to kill the horses and carry off the goods. “If these Indians,” he said, “ keep their word, it is to be supposed that the English will think no more of forming estab- lishments in those parts.” Supposing these to have been Carolinians, it is not surprising that nothing more is heard of them in those parts. It is to be observed, however, that the Carolina traders did not use horses, and the surmise at once suggests itself, whether the strangers on horseback thus announced were not other intruders crossing Ohio from the east. It is necessary, therefore, to cast our eyes in that direction.
The crowding together of villages of the vari- ous tribes in the vicinity of Detroit had not had the happy result which the French expected. The dissensions among them, followed in many
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cases by murders, were so ill-controlled by the governors as to cause not only the Miamis, but a large body of the Hurons or Wyandots, to with- draw. The latter are supposed to have attacked and robbed a French settlement at Sandusky in 1744, taking their position on the Sandusky bay and river, and thus becoming more accessible to the English. Most strenuous efforts were made by the French governors and their commandants to bring the recusants back to their posts, but the overpowering advantages of the English trade had undermined all French authority; so that after the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), which granted free trade and put an end to the monopoly in Canada, the French control of the fur trade was virtually destroyed. It was, in fact, the beginning of a foregone conclusion. The fatal spot in the French colonial system appeared in the simple statement, in Vaudreuil’s report in 1716, that u there are in Canada at present only 4,484 persons between 14 and 60 years of age capable of bearing arms, while in the English colonies, contiguous to Canada, there are sixty thousand.” The long, gallant struggle of a few devoted men like Fron- tenac and Talon, La Salle, Tonti, and the Le Moynes, hampered by the selfish king, penurious in all but his vices, and by the grinding monopo- lists, could not make head against the free energy of the English. One cannot repress a feeling of sympathy for the brave spirits who devoted their lives to a falling cause, and yet were made to feel in every hardship the tyrant’s rod.
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In the disordered state of Indian affairs which prevailed in this quarter, it is difficult to fix any details with accuracy. Only general results are to be recognized. New paths were to be made between the East and West. An Indian move- ment of another sort began, of far more impor- tance, inasmuch as it introduced the English for the first time apparently upon the soil of Ohio. This was the exodus of the Shawanees and Dela- ware Indians from eastern Pennsylvania. It began early in the eighteenth century, drawing with it the Moravian Missions, and followed, or rather attended by the inseparable parasites of the Indians, the traders ; a species of the white race of whom nothing good has ever been said, though some do not deserve the stigma which has blackened the name. The history of this move- ment has been handed down in a little volume entitled “An Enquiry into the Causes of the Alienation of the Delaware and Shawanees In- dians,” published in 1741, by Charles Thom- son, afterwards secretary of Congress. Without going into the details of this bitter story, it is enough to say that by fraud, forgery, and most cruel violence, the Delawares were persecuted out of their beautiful country on the upper waters of the Delaware River, and took refuge with their friends, the Shawanees, on the Susquehanna. These formed a part of the Shawanees nation, who had been driven out of Florida in the pre- vious century, and had migrated to the north in
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two bodies; this one passing along the eastern slope of the Alleghany Mountains into Pennsyl- vania, the other going to the Cumberland River, and thence passing over to the Wabash, where La Salle had met them. A considerable portion of the Delawares had joined the Moravians and settled down to industrial pursuits in villages near Bethlehem, on the Lehigh. These, in their emigration, were accompanied by their devoted pastors.
The Delawares and Shawanees on the Sus- quehanna were much oppressed by the Six Na- tions (the Tuscaroras having been added about 1713), and gradually took up their pilgrimage to the west. They were the first people at the north to scale the Alleghany Mountains. Halt- ing first on the upper waters of the Alleghany River (then known as the Ohio), they soon at- tracted the eye of Joncaire, the sleepless emissary of the French governor. With the arms and succor which he furnished them, they waged a bloody war of revenge upon the back settlements of Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia for many years.
But being still too near the Senecas, they de- scended the Alleghany River to the Ohio and there separated ; the Shawanees going on to rejoin their kindred at the Scioto, whilst the Delawares, in their more cosmopolitan way, distributed them- selves among the Mingoes, Wyandots, and Sha- wanees, wherever they could find a welcome.
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The date of these movements, with which the first progress of the English of the north toward Ohio took place, would be of interest, but neces- sarily is uncertain. Beauharnois and Aigremont, in their despatches as to the Oswego contro- versy in 1728, referred to measures taken by Vaudreuil in 1724 to bring the Pennsylvania Shawanees nearer to the French, and reported that they already had a village on the Ohio (Al- leghany). Their deputies were at Montreal in 1728. In the spring of 1732 Joncaire informed Beauharnois that they had gone further down and established villages on the east side, below the Attigue (French Creek), and that negotia- tions had taken place between them and the Hu- rons, Miamis and Ouiatanons for admitting them west of the Ohio. The Hurons had objected, but the Ouiatanons (who were Miamis and better known as Weas), now the nearest neighbors of the Shawanees, had expressed the joy they felt, and in that way matters had been harmoniously settled. “ They appear to be resolved,” he added, “ not to suffer the English to come that way to trade.” But he was deceived.
That it was about this period that the Dela- wares and Shawanees opened the way whereby the traders of the middle colonies, particularly Pennsylvania, first gained access to the country northwest of the Ohio, was authoritatively con- firmed in the Congress of the Colonies at Al- bany in 1754. The Six Nations complained that
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aggressions had been made upon them by the gov- ernors of Pennsylvania and Virginia, who had made new paths, they said, through their coun- try (western Pennsylvania), and were building houses without their consent. To counteract the charge, Conrad Wiese r, the official interpreter of Pennsylvania and a high authority among the Six Nations, having been adopted by the Mo- hawks in his youth, was brought forward and replied : 44 The road to Ohio is no new road ; it is an old and frequented road. The Shawanees and the Delawares removed thither above thirty years ago from Pennsylvania, ever since which time the road has been traveled by our traders at their invitation, and always with safety until within these few years.”
The time can only be approximated, but as to the main facts there can be no doubt. The swarm of traders, with their long trains of pack- horses and attendants, kept pace with the slow and desultory movements of the Indians. This con- stituted the primary stratum of Anglo-Saxon life in Ohio ; 44 civilization ” is a term which hardly belongs with this mongrel horde. A circum- stance mentioned in Christian Frederick Post’s journal will explain the large infusion of Irish in this emigration. 44 The Indian traders used to buy the transported Irish and other convicts,” he states, 44 as servants to be employed in carrying up the goods among the Indians. Many of these ran away from their masters and joined the In-
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dians.” Some of them, it may be added, became traders. Sir William Johnson, the king’s super- intendent of Indian affairs in the north and west, and George Croghan, his chief deputy at the west, also were Irishmen. The latter began his career as a trader about the year 1745 at the Huron River, in Ohio.
Putting together the two events, Beauharnois’ despatch in 1731 concerning the English with horses who were then appearing on the Wabash, and Joncaire’s report in 1732 as to the joy with which the Miamis had received the Shawanees from the east, it may reasonably be collected that the English traders, following in the wake of the Indians, had as early as the year 1730 made their way across the middle or southern part of Ohio under favor of the Miamis ; and furthermore that the Miamis had at this time extended themselves further away from the French to the position on the Big Miami River, where they were found by De Celoron in the year 1749, and by Gist in 1750. Necessarily, before this event, the solitudes had been broken, and the valleys of the Muskingum, Hockhocking, Scioto and the two Miamis, as well as the Cuyahoga, Huron, and Sandusky, had be- come the hunting grounds of the new nations from the west which from the beginning of the century had been gathering in. That all this had occurred by any authority or permission of the Five Nations would be hard to show.
The contest now began between the French
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and English for the control of the trade, and it may be said of the country, on the Ohio River. The Pennsylvania trader and the blacksmith, a great desideratum among the Indians, soon be- came prominent at all the Indian towns. Their free trade in arms, ammunition, rum and British goods, on French territory, not only made them an object of alarm as trespassers and smugglers, but, what was infinitely worse, their traffic, at less than half the tariff of prices which the French had fixed upon the Indians, made their competi- tion fatal to French commerce and French au- thority. The French commandants resorted to every art and even threats to hold the Indians to their regulations. But the contraband commerce was pushed by emissaries (Iroquois, Mohegans, and whites), for the purpose of sowing jealousy between the Ohio tribes and the French gover- nors. There is little doubt that the English co- lonial governors were granting licenses to their traders to encourage them in pushing their traffic. A distressing indication of this will be found in the piteous appeals which the Indian chiefs, in their visits and councils with the gov- ernors, constantly addressed to them to stop the traffic in ardent spirits, by which the traders were robbing and ruining their people. Hardly one of the provincial governors had the courage or humanity to heed them.
In this contention Croghan, the Montours, and McKee became the leading agents of the English.
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On the French side the two Joncaires, father and son, were ubiquitous. Without entering into mi- nute occurrences, a few only of the events which led to the French and Indian war can be re- ferred to ; the first serious outbreak being a con- spiracy of the Hurons under Nicolas at Sandusky in 1747, as usually represented, but really part of a far more extensive and dangerous scheme than that. There is every indication that a league including seventeen tribes for the over- throw of French authority at the west, and of which Demoiselle, chief of the Twightwees (Mi- amis), was the head, had been nearly formed. His town and fort was on the river La Roche (Big Miami) at or near the present city of Piqua. The plot was prematurely sprung by Nicolas, one of the chief agents in it. He was the head of the refractory band of Hurons who in 1744 had withdrawn from Detroit and estab- lished themselves at Sandusky Bay, or perhaps up the river. Here he was found by a party of Pennsylvania traders early in 1747, and at their instance, as the French authorities were informed, robbed and murdered five French traders, who, on their way from White River to Detroit, had passed through the town with their train.
Hostilities at once followed. The Miamis cap- tured the French fort at the head of the Mau- mee. Many of the French traders in Ohio, taken unawares, were pillaged and murdered. But the outbreak was quickly reduced by a stronger hand
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than the ordinary governors or commandants. By accident, the Marquis de la Galissoniere, a soldier and a statesman also, of eminent ability and energy, was at this time the acting governor at Quebec. Jonquiere, the regularly appointed governor, had been captured by the English on his voyage out, % and Galissoniere appointed ad interim . He arrived at Quebec in September, 1747, and had a short but eventful administra- tion. With his quick perception he grasped the whole field of trouble, and though the season was too late for immediate action, his measures were such that strong reinforcements and supplies were sent early in 1748 to Detroit and Mackinac, with instructions to Longueil, the commandant at Detroit, of such rigorous severity that Nicolas and his band were compelled to betake them- selves to the far West, and Demoiselle came with much show of grief to Detroit. With this, how- ever, Galissoniere was not satisfied.
De Celoron, a veteran major in the French service, who had conducted the reinforcements to Longueil, was ordered by Galissoniere, on his re- turn to Montreal, to fit out an expedition of French and Indians, and early in the next year to cross Lake Erie to the upper Ohio and proclaim the sovereignty of France. His orders were, after expelling the English traders and reducing the Indians to subordination, to visit Demoiselle at his fort on the river Roche and compel him to go back to the St. Joseph’s.
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Galissoniere’s purpose, distinctly, was to force an issue with the English provincial governors ; for as yet there was no hostility between the two governments, and the outbreak was merely local. He regarded the country on the Ohio as belong- ing by right and exclusively to France, and held that it was endangered by the temporizing con- duct of his predecessors. He penetrated the in- sidious designs of the English in the turbulence, revolts, and murders into which the tribes lately so closely allied with the French had been drawn; and it was his intention to have followed up De Celoron’s demonstration by establishing forts to command the Ohio River. He was recalled to France on what were considered weightier affairs.
These measures of Galissoni£re were really the inception of Ohio history, and the State may be proud of the auspices under which she first emerged from obscurity. De Celoron’s expedition, of about two hundred and fifty French and In- dians, left Montreal June 15, 1749. Lifting his bateaux out of Lake Erie into Lake Chautauqua, and forcing them through its outlet into the belle riviere (Alleghany), he buried in the opposite or south bank a lead plate inscribed with the proclamation of Louis XV. as king, and reassert- ing his dominion and possession of the Ohio, and of all rivers and countries connected with it. Similar plates were buried on the south side of the Ohio, near Wheeling, at the mouth of the Kanawha, and also at the mouth of the Muskin-
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gum and Big Miami rivers. France, it is to be observed, distinctly proclaimed her dominion over Western Virginia in this expedition.
On the 6th of August, at Chiningue (Logs- town), De Celoron captured a party of English traders, with a train of fifty horses and one hundred and fifty packages of furs, bound for Philadelphia. They pleaded their licenses from the governor of Pennsylvania, and were dis- charged, but were warned that they and their fellow-traders were to expect no more leniency. De Celoron also dispatched formal notices by them to the governor of Pennsylvania to the same effect, and passed on to the river Roche (Big Miami), which he entered with his bateaux Au- gust 30th. The navigation at that season must have been most difficult, but he arrived at Demoi- selle’s village (no fort is mentioned) September 13th. The chief he treated with much considera- tion and gave him handsome gifts, but reproached him for his ingratitude, and very peremptorily told him that he had come to take him by the hand, and lead him back to the graves of his fathers at Kiskakon, there to relight the old fires. Demoiselle and Baril, a chief on the Little Miami, accepted the gifts, but pleaded the lateness of the season, and so prevailed on De Celoron to allow them to postpone their removal until early in the following spring. The expedition then went on by land to the French fort, which had been re- established at the head of the Maumee.
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The fact that De Celoron’s report was the first authentic relation yet known of Ohio, excites a lively interest in it until it is read ; but is so dry, and restricted to the details of an official report, that, except as to topography, it is of little merit. The old soldier would not deign to notice a single scene in all the landscape through which he passed. To Father Bonnecamps, the chaplain and mathematician of this expedition, Ohio owes the first map of her boundaries or outlines yet dis- covered.
Hamilton, the governor of Pennsylvania, in a letter to Governor Clinton of New York, dated October 2d, admitted the reception of De Celo- ron’s protest, and in no wise denied granting the licenses to the traders which De Celoron charged upon him. His only apprehension seemed to be lest the traders might now be molested. He found that they were so satisfied of the friendship of the Indians, however, that they were deter- mined, he said, to prosecute the trade “ which has of late been a very valuable one.”
Another provocation of the French now arose out of the formation of the Ohio Company, an association of leading Virginians and some Lon- don merchants engaged in the Virginia trade. Two of General Washington's brothers were members. Thomas Lee, president of the Virginia Council, is usually accounted as the originator of the plan, which was to make settlements on the fertile lands of the Ohio valley, marvelous accounts
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of which were being brought in by the traders. But Smollett’s History attributes the plan to Governor Spotswood, and states that he proposed it to the English ministry in 1716. This was the year of his celebrated “ Tramontane expedition ” to the Blue Ridge, escorted by the Knights of the Golden Horseshoe. Spotswood’s proposition was laid aside, Smollett intimates, partly from fear of the French, but more perhaps because of the dispute just then arising between Virginia and Pennsylvania concerning their boundaries on the Ohio.
Besides colonizing, the object of the Ohio Com- pany was to enter into competition with the Penn- sylvanians in the lucrative business of smuggling among the Indians, a business which the Pennsyl- vanians hitherto had enjoyed almost exclusively. The petition which they addressed, not to the governor *of Virginia but to the king, was the be- ginning of operations in Western lands: it asked a grant of lands northwest of the Ohio, if deemed expedient, but mainly between the Monongahela and Kanawha rivers, so that the water communi- cations between the heads of the Potomac and Ohio might be available for transportation. The king approved it, and authorized a grant of 600,000 acres to be made. But the grant was never issued.
Without waiting for it, the company erected stores at Wills Creek (Cumberland), opened a road or path across the mountains to the Monon-
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gahela, and prepared to erect a fort at the conflu- ence of this and the Alleghany River, then known as the “Forks.” Goods were imported from Eng- land and sent forward. The company also sent out Christopher Gist, an experienced woodsman and surveyor, well known among the Indians, with instructions to “cross the mountains and search out the lands upon the Ohio and other ad- joining branches of the Mississippi, as low down as the great falls thereof.” He had instructions from Governor Dinwiddie, also, to invite a meet- ing of the Indian tribes at Logstown, a village of the Senecas on the Ohio, sixteen miles below the Forks, to receive gifts which their father, the king of England, had sent over as a token of amity.
The English traders and emissaries on the Ohio became more busy and defiant than ever. De Celoron had no sooner turned his back than the traffic and intriguing with the Indians was re- commenced, new forces from Virginia and Mary- land entering into the competition. But Jon- quiere, who in May, 1749, succeeded Galissoniere as governor, disapproved of the leniency which De Celoron had shown to Demoiselle and the traders. De Celoron, being now commandant at Detroit, received orders which soon convinced the English that his warnings were no idle form. All traders who were found by the French in Ohio were arrested by his troops and auxiliaries, the Ottawas. He also established a fort at the upper end of Sandusky Bay.
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Captain Gist set forth on his exploration of Ohio about November 1, 1750. Descending the Alleghany and Ohio rivers to the Big Beaver and thence crossing the country, he came on the 5th of December to the Tuscarawas (then called the Mooskingum, or Elk’s Eye Creek) at a point near the line between the counties of Stark and Tusca- rawas. Going down that stream, through beauti- ful meadows and open timber, though in some places there was none, he arrived on the 14th at Muskingum, a large town of the Wyandots, and the residence of their king, situated some fifteen miles above the confluence of the Elk’s Eye and White woman’s Creek (Wahlhonding). Here he met George Croghan and Andrew Montour on an official expedition, and found the British colors hoisted over the king’s house. This was in con- sequence of an alarm excited by the arrival of fleeing traders, who were coming in every day, stripped of their property by strong parties of French and Indians traversing the country, and glad to escape with their lives. A council of the Wyandots was held, at which Croghan and Mon- tour announced the arrival of the king’s great present in Virginia, and formally invited them to go and meet the governor, to partake of “ Rog- goney’s favor.” The King and Council thanked them, but “ would wait for a general council of the Indians next Spring.”
In company with Croghan and Montour and their escort, Gist rode over to the Scioto and
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down its east bank to the lower Shawanees town, situated, as he states, on both sides of the Ohio, a little below the Scioto. Here Croghan and Mon- tour made another most elaborate effort to win over the Indians, but with no better result than with the Wyandots.
They then went across the country to the Pic- qualinees, Piankeshaws, or Picktown (a tribe of the Tawightis, or Tawixtis, as the Miamis at that time were called by the English), on the west bank of the “ Big Mineami.” Gist states that it contained four hundred families, and was one of the strongest Indian towns in that part of the continent. Numbers of traders had taken refuge there. Some had their own houses. The fort wanted repairs, and the traders were helping to line the inside with logs. The success of the English emissaries here was complete. A dele- gation of four Ottawas appeared at the council with speeches and gifts from the French. The scene which followed, as described by Gist, was a dramatic one. The Ottawas were too haughty, and made themselves offensive by allusions to the recent backsliding of their brothers, the Miamis. The Piankeshaw king arose and withdrew in a passion whilst the Ottawa speaker was still ha- ranguing. The council, with more dignity, heard him through, and reserved their decision until the next morning. It then came from the Tawighti war chief, who gave the voice of the Miamis against the French, and in terms so emphatic that
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the Ottawas lost no time in getting out of the town.
From this point Gist turned south, and went back through Kentucky to Virginia. His descrip- tions are far more interesting and show keener observation than those in De Celoron’s Journal, though limited much in the same manner to the object of his special mission. A single extract respecting the country through which he passed, between Portsmouth and Piqua, will give a glimpse of primitive Ohio : —
“ All the land from the Shawanese town to this place (the Tawighti town) except the first twenty miles, which is broken, is fine, rich, level land, well timbered with large walnut, ash, sugar trees, cherry, etc., well watered with a great number of little streams, and abounds with turkeys, deer, elks, and most sorts of game, particularly buffaloes, thirty or forty of which are frequently seen feeding in one meadow ; in short, it wants nothing but cultivation to make it a most de- lightful country. The land upon the Great Mineami River is very rich, level, and well timbered, some of the finest meadows that can be. The grass here grows to a great height in the clear fields, of which there are a great number, and the bottoms are full of white clo- ver, wild rye, and blue grass.
“ Returning,” he says, as far as Mad Creek with his former company, “ we there parted, they for Hock- hocking and I for the Shawanese town ; and as I was alone, and knew that the French Indians had threatened us and would probably pursue or lie in wait for us, I left the path and went southwestward down the Little
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Mineami river or creek, where I bad fine traveling through rich land and beautiful meadows, in which I could sometimes see forty or fifty buffaloes feeding at once. The Little Mineami continued to run through the middle of a fine meadow, about a mile wide, very clear, like an old field, and not a bush in it. I could see the buffaloes in it about two miles off.”
The triumph of the English was short, and the Piankeshaw king was made to rue it. Captures and murders now multiplied on both sides. By order of De Celoron, three Pennsylvanians who ventured to Sandusky, and another who was so bold as to go to the French fort at the head of the Maumee, about the close of the year (1751), were arrested as spies and sent to Montreal. After an examination by Jonquiere, they were sent to France for trial. Lord Albemarle, the British minister at Paris, formally demanded their release, on the plea that they had been cap- tured illegally. The right of sovereignty over the territory of Ohio thus became a question of state. The French minister released the prison- ers, but the settlement of the main question was left to the entanglements of diplomacy.
Under the skillful handling of Croghan and his auxiliaries, the Indians were worked up to such a pitch of exasperation that fifty or sixty French- men were computed to have been slain in the for- ests of Ohio and on the Wabash in the fall and winter of 1751-52. The Miamis openly u offered the hatchet” to the English governors. To add
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to the complication, Governor Dinwiddie, profess- ing to serve the king, now came into the field, equally jealous of the French and of the Penn- sylvanians. He denied that Penn had any title on the Ohio River, and persevered in his purpose of holding his meeting with the Indians at Logs- town by sending three commissioners there in May, 1752, assisted by Wieser and Gist, to treat with the Senecas, Shawanees, and Delawares. A generous distribution of gifts in the king’s name was made, and a share reserved for the Miamis, who did not come as expected. Dinwiddie’s pur- pose was to obtain a ratification by the western Indians of a cession which, it was alleged, had been made by the Six Nations to the king in 1744, at the treaty of Lancaster, of all their lands within the bounds of Virginia. This treaty had been a scene of drunkenness, debauchery, and fraud, disgraceful to the commissioners and to all who were concerned in it. The sham, however, could not be palmed off upon the savages at Logstown. They complained there was u too much pen-and-ink work ” about this matter, and, as they understood it, the cession made at Lan- caster did not extend west of the Alleghany hills. But they agreed not to molest the settlements southeast of the Ohio River, and consented, as Dinwiddie understood it, that he should build a fort at the forks of the Ohio.
But while this u pen-and-ink business” was going on at Logstown, De Celoron, by a sharp
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and decisive blow, put an end for a time to British schemes on the Ohio. He dispatched from De- troit two hundred and forty Frenchmen and Ot- tawas, who suddenly fell upon the Tawightis, June 21, 1752. The Picqualinny town and fort were captured, many of the Indians and traders slain, and others carried off as prisoners. Their goods were confiscated, and the Piankeshaw king was killed and devoured by the Ottawas, in revenge for his insult and murders. This chief was called 44 Old Britain ” by the English. Whether or not it was Demoiselle does not appear. The French officers in this expedition are not ordinarily named, though Belletre and Longueil had been reported to Sir William Johnson, in the summer of 1751, as having gone up Lake Ontario to 44 at- tack the Twigtee village where the English are building a stone house for trading or, as ex- pressed by him to Governor Clinton, 46 to stop the Philadelphians building at or near the Ohio.”
This reduced the Ohio tribes to abject submis- sion. They sent most imploring messages to the English governors for aid, but received nothing in return but assurances of sympathy. The angry Miamis turned back again to their French allegiance, and sent deputies to Detroit and Mon- treal to sue for mercy. 44 Thus,” in Mr. Ban- croft’s phrase, 44 on the alluvial lands of western Ohio began the contest that was to scatter death broadcast through the world.”
Without detailing the events of the seven
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years’ war, by which the country northwest of the Ohio was converted into a province of the British dominions, we may at least bestow a glance at that part which was fought so closely upon its border as to be essentially a part of the history of Ohio.
The Marquis Du Quesne was sent to succeed Jonquiere as governor in May, 1752, with instruc- tions to drive the English and their traders away from the Ohio. For that purpose he sent a strong force early in the next year, under the Sieur Marin (Morang the English had it), a fierce old veteran of the most determined charac- ter. To reach the head of the Ohio he landed at Presq-isle (Erie), and built a fort on the penin- sula. A wagon road wbs cut through to the west branch of French Creek (Le Bceuf), eigh- teen miles distant, and another fort constructed there, with a depot for stores midway between the two. At this the English on the Alleghany fled. Tanacharisson, the half-king of the Senecas, came to Marin and protested indignantly, “ This land is ours and not yours.”
Marin, throwing aside all ceremony, denounced him as foolish. “You say this land belongs to jmu ; but not so much of it as the black of my nails is yours. It is my land ; and I will have it, let who will stand up for it.”
Marin had pledged Du Quesne that he would be upon the Ohio before winter. But want of supplies for his fifteen hundred men, the low
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water in French Creek, the heat and malarial fevers, proved an insuperable combination. His guns and heavy stores could not be moved down to the Alleghany. The unhappy general closed the year by sending back twelve hundred of his men, reserving a garrison of three hundred at Le Boeuf, where he remained and where he soon died. It was here that Major George Washing- ton, in December, presented to St. Pierre, Ma- rin’s second in command, Governor Dinwiddie’s letter, addressed to the commander of the French forces, demanding that he “ retire from his Bri- tannic Majesty’s dominions.”
Through the terrible inclemencies of that win- ter, with Captain Gist as a guide, Washington had come to Tanacharisson, at his town on the Ohio, for an escort. Tanacharisson told him of Marin’s speech, and seemed in no wise inclined to meet the Frenchman again. Washington would accept no excuse, and with Gist and Tanacha- risson made his way to Le Boeuf. The delays and plots which the cunning Joncaire and the French invented to cut him off need not be re- lated. Taking St. Pierre’s reply, and a head full of observations he had been making on the French, the young envoy returned, through great perils, to Williamsburgh, and made his report to the governor.
St. Pierre’s reply led Dinwiddie to take im- mediate measures to prevent the descent which the French, as Washington had discovered, were
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intending upon Logstown. Captain William Trent had already been commissioned to raise a company of one hundred men, and sent to Red- stone. He was now ordered to build a fort at the junction of the Monongahela and Alleghany rivers, and in February began it. But on the 16th of April, a French force of one thousand men with artillery, under command of Contre- coeur, descended upon his little party in his ab- sence, captured their work, and proceeded to erect in place of it the strong work, armed with cannon, known as Fort Du Quesne. France now held the Ohio and the lakes.
Galissoniere’s policy had triumphed, and for the present the question was settled. The Eng- lish were completely driven out. France by this measure became possessed of all the country west of the Alleghany Mountains. Ohio and the Northwest relapsed wholly into her control. How completely the Miamis and their confederacy were humbled appears from a letter of Washing- ton to the governor of Pennsylvania, announcing the capture of the Virginians on the Ohio, and that six hundred Ottawas and Chippewas were coming by way of the Scioto to aid the French.
The supine indifference of the English colonies in this state of affairs on the Ohio seems at the present day incredible. All the horrors of an Indian invasion were threatened. Governor Din- widdie addressed the most urgent appeals to the provincial governors, as well as to the British
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government, to aid in defending the frontier. The provincial assemblies with one accord ex- cused themselves. Pennsylvania would do noth- ing unless Virginia would relinquish her claim to the territory now invaded. We get some insight of the wrangle which subsequently distracted the States during the war for independence.
The British government manifested more con- cern than the colonies. Years had been wasted in a tedious, inconsequential exchange of memo- rials and conventions between commissioners of the two nations at Paris, in which each had been seeking to amuse the other with a seeming desire to preserve peace, while secretly laboring to pre- pare for war, in America. But the British cabi- net was alarmed at the advantage now gained by France, and fitted out an expedition in February, 1755, under General Braddock as commander-in- chief of forces in America ; the first which Great Britain sent to this country. He was secretly instructed that, with the regiments which he brought over and two provincial regiments to be raised by Shirley and Pepperel as colonels, and companies of riflemen and rangers levied else- where, he should direct three expeditions against Fort Du Quesne, Niagara, and Crown Point.
All this was divulged in July by the capture of Braddock’s baggage and papers at the defeat and destruction of his forces on the Monongahela. All his instructions, plans, and correspondence with his government and with the provincial au-
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thorities were exposed in a “ Memorial ” which the French government issued to the courts of Europe to show the perfidy of the English. Nothing could better evince what mere sport American affairs at this time were with the Eu- ropean statesmen and diplomatists than the posi- tion taken by the French minister on receiving intelligence of Du Quesne’s advance, and posses- sion of the Ohio : he made a formal proposal to England that both nations should retire from the Ohio and the territory west of the mountains, so that “the respective pretensions ” might be “ ami- cably submitted to the commission appointed at Paris, to the end that the differences between the two courts may be terminated by a speedy recon- ciliation,” suggesting, at the same time, that it “ would relieve his Christian Majesty of an un- easy impression if his Britannic Majesty would be open and explicit as to the destination of the armament (Braddock’s) last raised in England.” But the British court was sore, and after tempo- rizing sufficiently for Braddock’s expeditions to march, declared war in May. France also de- clared war in June.
Braddock’s disastrous fate, followed by years of ravage and desolation of western Pennsylva- nia and Virginia by the French Indians ; the loss of Minorca, where Galissoniere, by his superior manoeuvring of the French fleet, drove off Admi- ral Byng ; the mismanagement of Braddock’s successor, Lord Loudoun, by which every rneas*
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ure for the next two or three campaigns in America was somehow defeated or miscarried, — all seemed to point to the overthrow of the English, and to the permanent establishment of French dominion over the lakes and the West.
Fortunately, as the people of Ohio will ever probably esteem it, the House of Commons and public opinion in England compelled the king at this crisis, against all his antipathies, to accept William Pitt, afterwards Earl of Chatham, for a brief term as the head of his government. In June, 1757, this great minister succeeded to the long, ignominious control of affairs by the Duke of Newcastle and his followers, and in his admin- istration, short but momentous, breathed an am- bition akin to his own into the generals and ad- mirals of a new school to whom he committed the armies and fleets in America. The losses were soon repaired. Among the gains was Fort Du Quesne, which on November 9, 1758, on the approach of General Forbes and his powerful forces, in which were Colonels Washington and Bouquet, was evacuated and blown up by the French. By Wolfe’s great and crowning victory on the heights of Quebec, September 13, 1759, the result was determined. The contest in Upper Canada continued until the total surrender to Sir Jeffry Amherst, September 8, 1760, by the ca- pitulation of Vaudreuil, the governor. This ended the war in America. War on the ocean and in the West Indies continued until late in 1762,
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when preliminaries for peace were signed, and on the 10th of February, 1763, the Treaty of Paris was closed, and “ the confines between the dominions of Great Britain and France in Amer- ica fixed irrevocably by a line drawn along the middle of the river Mississippi from its source to the river Iberville, and by a line through this river and lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain to the sea.”
Men may question if the victorious cause was the just one, but accepting the accomplished fact, immortal gratitude attaches to Mr. Pitt from every dweller by the lakes and rivers of the West. It is his glory that he struck this imperial blow just in time to save the undivided continent to the Anglo-Norman race and institutions. The interest and importance which he attached to the possession of the Ohio will be seen in an extract from a letter written by him on receiving the news of the capture of Fort Du Quesne : —
“ Whitehall, January 23, 1759.
“ Sir : I am now to acquaint you that the King has been pleased, immediately on hearing the news of the success of his arms on the river Ohio, to direct the Commander in Chief of his Majesty’s forces in North America, and General Forbes, to lose no time in con- certing the properest and speediest means for completely restoring, if possible, the ruined Fort Du Quesne to a defensible and respectable state, or for erecting another in the room of it, of sufficient strength, and every way adequate to the great importance of maintaining his
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Majesty’s subjects in the undisputed possession of the Ohio ; of effectually cutting off all trade and communi- cation this way between Canada and the Western and Southwestern Indians ; of protecting the British colo- nies from the incursions to which they have been ex- posed since the French built the above fort, and thereby made themselves masters of the navigation of the Ohio ; and of fixing again the several Indian nations in their alliance with and dependence upon his Majesty’s gov- ernment.”
CHAPTER V.
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The Treaty of Paris may be said to have laid the corner-stone of American independence, ft lifted the cloud of terror which bad so long over- hung the great wall of the Alleghanies. The colonists no longer felt that they needed Eng- land’s protecting arm to secure them from the French. The frontiersmen had never doubted their ability to cope with the savage but for the aid and supplies which their enemies received from Canada and the western posts.
Stripped of all verbiage, the treaty declared that the king of France ceded and guaranteed to the king of England Canada and all his depen- dencies or rights east of the Mississippi River.
The king of Spain also was a party to the treaty, and ceded East and West Florida to Eng- land for the restoration of Havana, which had been captured in the war. The king of England, on his part, granted to the inhabitants of the ceded territories the liberty of the Catholic reli- gion and worship, according to the rites of that church, as far as the laws of Great Britain ad- mitted, and the right, if they chose, to sell their
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estates and quit the country within eighteen months.1
The treaty would have let loose the land spec- ulators and the whole Pennsylvania and Virginia border upon the Indians. The king of England, therefore, by an order in council, October 7, 1763, known as the “ King’s Proclamation,” proceeded to erect the three new provinces of Quebec and East and West Florida with certain boundaries, giving to the governors power to summon assem- blies for legislation, establish courts, etc. The gov- ernors of these provinces were authorized to make grants of lands within their respective bounda- ries; especially for bounties, on a fixed scale, to all the officers and men of the land and naval forces who had served in the late war in America.
But in order that the Indians under the king’s protection should not be molested or disturbed in the possession of parts of the late conquest reserved as their hunting-grounds, it was declared to be his will and pleasure that no governor in any of his colonies or plantations in America should presume, until his further pleasure, to make grants for “ any lands beyond the heads or sources of any of the rivers which fall into the Atlantic from the west or northwest, or any lands whatever reserved to the Indians.”
The proclamation also declared “ all the lands and territories lying westward of the sources of the rivers which fall into the sea from the west 1 See Appendix, No. I.
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and northwest, as aforesaid, other than those set off to the three new provinces, to be reserved, under the king’s sovereignty, protection, and do- minion, for the use of the Indians ; and all his subjects were strictly forbidden, under pain of his displeasure, from making any purchases or set- tlements whatever, or taking possession of any of the lands so reserved, without his special leave and license for that purpose first obtained. All persons who had either willfully or inadvertently settled upon any lands within the country re- served to the Indians, were required to remove themselves forthwith.”
Private persons were forbidden to purchase lands of the Indians, and no cessions from them even to the king were to be taken unless in his name, and at public councils or assemblies of the Indians held by his governors for that purpose.1
This exclusion of the colonies and plantations from the territory west of the mountains, and taking it under the king’s exclusive domain, was not a sudden or arbitrary measure. Before the war the Albany congress (1754), in their “ Re- presentation ” to the king, had recommended ex- plicitly “ that the bounds of those colonies which extend to the South Sea be contracted and limited by the Allegheny or Apalachian Mountains.” But this was more effectively done by the French the same year. To enforce the pledge of religious liberty given to the Roman Catholics in the treaty, 1 See Appendix, No. I.
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General Gage issued a proclamation in December, 1764, reassuring the French in Illinois that they had the same rights and privileges in that respect as enjoyed in Canada ; and if, instead of retiring to New Orleans, they should take the oath of fidelity, they might rely upon enjoying the same security for their persons, property, and liberty of trade as old subjects. The French had been ex- ceedingly restive, and it was suspected were still inciting the Indians against the English.
The king’s proclamation shows that, in the construction put upon the treaty by the crown authorities, the ceded territory was a new acqui- sition by conquest. The proclamation was the formal appropriation of it as the king’s domain, embracing all the country west of the heads or sources of the rivers falling into the Atlantic. This appropriation, by the settled principles of the king’s prerogative under English law, vested the domain in him exclusively, so that it could inure to no subject without his further pleasure, as expressed in the proclamation. The royal prerogative admitted of no trusts, or participation in its fruits or flowers.
As the ceded territory embraced what is now the State of Ohio, this consequently passed to the crown, in the same full right and dominion as the king of France had held it at the begin- ning of the war. In this condition it remained until it should be established as a new province, or annexed to one of the pre-existing provinces ;
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subject only to military commanders or Indian agents, acting under the immediate orders of the king in council, or of the Board of Trade, which at that period administered the king’s domain in America. As a matter of fact, neither of the provincial governments, by which the thirteen colonies were then controlled, ever exercised or assumed any control of it. In respect to them it stood much in the same position as that now sub- sisting between the states and the territories.
From this it results that the present territory of Ohio, in common with all the reservation thus made by the crown to its own immediate domin- ion, has its proprietary and political basis exclu- sively in the Treaty of Paris and the king’s proclamation of 1763. The primary title in the soil of Ohio comes through the treaty, which, in the cession to the king, excepted only such pos- sessions as had been granted to the inhabitants under the French law. As no French grants had been made in Ohio, the soil passed to the king entire.
Under these conditions, another of which was the reservation that the king would dispose of this Indian territory according to his further will and pleasure, Ohio was now relegated, under its new sovereign, to the mercies of the Indians, the traders and the waifs and strays, who were quickly in motion for the border.
The first act of British authority was the dis- patch of a company of regulars and two hundred
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and fifty rangers, under Major Robert Rogers, to take possession of Detroit and its dependencies, in September, 1760, immediately after the surren- der of Montreal and Canada. This was accom- plished without any conflict ; and Rogers, after stationing his regular troops at Detroit as a garri- son, and sending small detachments to occupy the French forts Miami and Gatanois and their post at the mouth of the Scioto, returned by way of Fort Pitt. His journal of the expedition gives interesting descriptions of the lake shore, and his return from Detroit around the western shore of Lake Erie, and across the country to Pitts- burgh. He was an illiterate man, and unprinci- pled in money matters, but a good ranger and observer. He is supposed to have met Pontiac at the Cuyahoga, on his route westward. The scene has been portrayed as highly dramatic. His own account of the occasion does not mention Pontiac. The meeting which he describes with the Indian delegates was at the Chogage River, thirty or thirty-two miles west of Presqu’isle, therefore not the Cuyahoga. His itinerary across Ohio points out many landmarks now easily rec- ognized, and, like all the early descriptions, re- counts marvels in regard to the profusion and variety of game.
In July, 1761, Sir William Johnson made a grand progress to Detroit as superintendent of Indian affairs, bearing gifts to the Ottawas and their confederate tribes. His journal of the voy-
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age along the lake shore, in going and returning, adds further information as to the country, and is especially full as to the meetings with the savages at Detroit, where he vainly supposed that a firm and lasting peace was established. As serving to show the progress of the West, Sir William men- tions a dinner party by the commandant at De- troit, and a ball at which he opened the dance with one of the French belles, keeping up the gay- eties until five o’clock the next morning. He had no suspicion of the great revolt of Pontiac, so near at hand, but the disclosure he makes as to the weakness of the British posts is quite significant. He notes the force in the garrisons, as being 150 at Detroit, 30 at Mackinac, 20 at Fort Miami (Fort Wayne), 30 at St. Joseph, 30 at Ouiata- non, 12 at Sandusky, and 30 at Presqu’isle, Le Boeuf, and Venango each. Neither he nor Rogers make any mention of a fort at Sandusky, but Sir William refers to a “ block house to be built about three leagues from the mouth of the lake.”
All this while the French virtually had control of the Indians and their whole country on the Wabash and west of the lakes. As already seen, they had from the time of erecting Fort Du Quesne thoroughly reconverted them all, the Mi- amis included. The French traders also, from that time, had penetrated and monopolized the whole country east and west of Fort Pitt, and though somewhat worsted, after the capture of Fort Du Quesne in 1758, in competition with the
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English on the Ohio, they still held their own everywhere west of it. The recoil of the border settlers, however, which commenced with that event, their eagerness for revenge, and their evi- dent purpose to regain their former haunts, aroused the hostility of the Indians. The un- happy savages, now between the French and the English, began to realize the picture drawn by a French Indian : —
“ Brothers, ” he exclaimed, “ are you ignorant of the difference between our Father and the English? Go see the forts our Father has erected and you will find that the land beneath his walls is still hunting ground, having fixed himself in those places we frequent only to supply our wants : whilst the English, on the contrary, no sooner get possession of a country than the game is forced to leave it ; the trees fall down before them ; the earth becomes bare ; and we find among them hardly wherewithal to shelter us when the night falls.”
Still better, however, as a stroke of Indian humor, was the hit from a Mohawk at one of their conferences with Sir William Johnson : —
“ I must now say it is not with our consent that the French have committed any hostilities at the Ohio. We don’t know what you Christians, English and French to- gether, intend. We are so hemmed in by both that we have hardly a hunting place left. In a little while, if we find a bear in a tree, there will immediately appear an owner of the land to challenge the property and hin- der us from killing it, which is our livelihood. We are so perplexed between both that we hardly know what to say or think.,,
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The result of the alarm and exasperation ex- cited among the Indians of the Northwest by the intrigues and false reports of the French traders, working against the English with infinite tact, was the terrible outbreak in 1763, close upon the Treaty of Paris, known as Pontiac’s War. The Ohio Indians were supposed by Sir William John- son to be the chief authors of the mischief, and burst forth like hornets. As is now better under- stood, it was the genius and work of Pontiac, a chief of the Ottawas. This nation, it will be ob- served, had been constant to the French. Pon- tiac’s capacity for war was great, and his hatred of the English intense. He sent to New Orleans for arms and munitions. His faculty for administra- tion and scheming employed two secretaries, one to write his letters, another to read those which he received ; neither being permitted to know the transactions of the other. By this sudden gust every one of the British posts just mentioned, ex- cept Detroit and Fort Pitt, were swept away. Croghan, the deputy superintendent, computed that in four months two thousand men, women, and children on the borders of Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia had been murdered, or taken across the Ohio in captivity. Detroit was saved by a forewarning which Gladwin, the com- mandant, caught from a friendly Indian. Fort Pitt was rescued only by a forced march of Colonel Bouquet, a Swiss officer of great merit command- ing a battalion of the Royal Americans, sixtieth
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British Infantry, and a masterly stratagem, by which, within an hour, he saved his own force and the beleaguered fortress from the exultant sav- ages, and routed them, filling them with dismay at his skill in battle.
To penetrate Ohio and break up this unex- pected opposition of British rule, two expeditions were sent there in 1764 : one under Colonel Brad- street, who passed up Lake Erie from Niagara in July ; the other under Colonel Bouquet, which, from the difficulty met in transporting troops and supplies across the mountains, was delayed until October. Bouquet then marched directly across the country from Fort Pitt to the Muskingum with two battalions of the forty-second and six- tieth regiments, and about seven hundred provin- cial troops, pitching his camp, October 13th, on the bank of the Tuscarawas, near the point where Captain Gist had first approached it.
The two expeditions were to have acted in concert ; and as Bradstreet’s movement by water would advance more speedily, he was to have proceeded first to Detroit and Mackinac, and then to have fallen back to a position at San- dusky. This was to check any attempt of the Ottawas and Hurons to assist the Senecas (Min- goes), Shawanees, and Delawares against Colonel Bouquet, whose special mission was to punish these tribes.
A blunder of Bradstreet at the first step came near frustrating both expeditions, and but for
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Bouquet’s superior military judgment and sagac- ity would have defeated the campaign. While pushing his trains across the mountains in August he received a despatch from Bradstreet, dated the 14th, at Presqu’isle, informing him that he had there met the Delawares and Shawanees and made peace. The crafty warriors on the Scioto had discovered the English plan, and sent ten of their chiefs to intercept him, under a pretense of suing for peace. Bradstreet fell into the snare and concluded an armistice, the deputies feigning that their warriors were recalled, when in fact they were murdering the whites all along the frontier below, and trusting that the distance would hide their falsehood.
Colonel Bouquet was not so easily deceived, and prosecuted his march without hesitation. The savages were in consternation at his sudden appearance almost in the heart of their country. Their dread of him was the greater because of the astonishing blow he had given them the year before at Fort Pitt, and because their scouts, who had tracked him every day, were unable to gain the least insight as to his numbers or supplies. This was the result of the peculiar order of marching and camping which he designed, much the same as that of General Wayne thirty years later. Without firing a gun, he so manoeuvred that the chiefs of the Senecas, Delawares, and Shawanees came to treat for peace two days after he had halted. For this purpose the camp was
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moved two miles down the river to a high bluff covered with stately timber, and affording abun- dant grass for his horses and cattle.
Here, on October 17th, the first council was held. The chiefs sought to throw all blame for the war upon the western nations, and sued for mercy, offering to deliver up all their prisoners. They were dismissed until the next day, Col- onel Bouquet promising simply to give an an- swer then, but without intimating what answer he should make. Decision was then postponed to the 20th, to tighten the suspense.
On this occasion he resorted to the heroic treatment which Marin had applied to Tanacha- risson at Presqu’isle. He denounced their excuses as childish. Their conduct, he told them, had been perfidious, in murdering and plundering the traders after inviting them back ; attacking Fort Pitt, which had been rebuilt with their ex- press consent ; murdering the king’s messengers, when such were sacred among all nations, how- ever barbarous ; and, notwithstanding their treaty with Bradstreet, continuing to keep up havoc and bloodshed on the border to that day. He taunted them with their falsehood in pretending to Bradstreet to recall their warriors and deliver up prisoners. But this, he said, was nothing new. They were habitual violators of treaties and faith.
“I am now to tell you,” he concluded, “that we will no longer be imposed upon by your prom- ises. This army shall not leave your country till
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you have fully complied with every condition now to be agreed. It is in our power to extirpate you, but the English are merciful, and you shall have mercy and peace if we can depend upon your future good behavior. I have brought with me the relatives of the people you have massa- cred or captured. They are impatient for re- venge, and restrained only by the assurances I have given them that there shall be no peace until you have given full satisfaction.
“ I give you twelve days to deliver into my hands at Wakatomica” (a Shawanees town, now Dresden) “ all the prisoners in your possession, without exception, English, French, women, chil- dren, and negroes. You are also to furnish them clothing, provisions, and horses to carry them to Fort Pitt.”
After this speech the council was dismissed, and Bouquet refused to shake hands with the chiefs. They were to know, he told them, that the English never took enemies by the hand un- til peace was concluded. He removed his army to a point near the confluence of the Tuscarawas and Wahlhonding, instead of Wakatomica, and there established a fortified camp, with a store- house for supplies, and a council house in which to receive the Indians. Houses were built also for the reception of the captives, with proper attendants, even a matron to take care of the women and children.
The finale of this campaign was a scene hardly
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matched in history, and which cannot be de- scribed here in full. On the arrival of the pris- oners, there were meetings of fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, brothers and sisters, some recog- nizing long-lost relations, rising as it were from the dead. There were others bereaved and speechless at not meeting their lost ones. Most remarkable of all, there were numbers reluctant to be given up, and instances of Indians who parted with beloved captives in torrents of tears, clinging to them as long as they remained in camp, and bringing them daily all the gifts they could bestow. Two hundred and six were sur- rendered, of whom eighty-one were men, the others women and children. The last to appear were the Shawanees. On November 12th their chief and forty warriors met Colonel Bouquet in council, and with a mingling of fierce pride in their submission offered him part of their pris- oners ; being unable to bring the rest, as they urged, because they belonged to some great men who were absent. These, it was promised, should certainly be forthcoming at Fort Pitt in the next spring. Bouquet cut this short by demanding six of the warriors as hostages. This being granted and every demand settled, his army and the rescued captives returned on the 28th of No- vember to Fort Pitt.
Within two months, therefore, ended this expe- dition, which, except that of General Wayne, was perhaps the most effective Indian campaign
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in the military history of America. This meri- torious officer was promoted, but he died the next year in command at Pensacola. It has been a subject of speculation what difference might have occurred if Great Britain had not lost two such officers as Bouquet and Sir William Johnson by death before the war of the Revolution.
The effect of this demonstration did not reach the tribes on the Wabash and Mississippi. There the jealous hostility of the French, and also of the Spanish at St. Louis (founded about this time as a trading post), had a pernicious influence. In 1765 Sir William Johnson sent Croghan, as his deputy, to assume formal possession and con- trol for the king over the Indians at that extrem- ity of his department. Croghan descended the Ohio in May with an escort of Mingoes, Dela- wares, and Shawanees, stopping some days at the Scioto to take custody of a number of French- men who had been trading without license, and by his order had been arrested by the Delawares and Shawanees. His journal, among notes of the country through which he passed, mentions that the Shawanees town at the mouth of the Scioto, which he and Gist had visited in the winter of 1750-51, had since been swept away by a flood swelling nine feet over the banks of the Ohio. It had been rebuilt on the south bank, but aban- doned during the late war, the people removing up the Scioto.
At the Wabash, Croghan and his embassy
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were captured by a band of young Kickapoo and Mascouten warriors from the Maumee, at the in- stigation's he suspected, of the French traders. He and his white attendants were robbed, and hurried up the Wabash ; the French at Vincennes not only manifesting no sympathy, but openly trafficking with the robbers for their spoils. But on arriving among the Miamis, the captors met with such indignation from the old chiefs as to alarm them for their own safety. The Miamis knew Croghan’s office and power.
He was released immediately, and the disaster upon the whole proved fortunate. Croghan made use of it to impress the tribes on the upper Wabash and Maumee with such a sense of the king’s liberality that they consented that British troops should occupy all posts which the French had held. A detachment of the Forty-second Highlanders was sent from Fort Pitt for that purpose in September. He also met Pontiac, who was crossing the country from Illinois to De- troit. This led to full explanations, and Pontiac was reconciled. He had fought the English be- cause, as he declared, the French had deceived his people ; making them believe that the Eng- lish were going to give their country to the Cherokees and make them slaves.
Croghan and his Indian escort, now reunited, proceeded down the Maumee, and held councils with the Pottawatomies, Ottawas, and Kickapoos, then occupying that valley, and with deputies of
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the Twightwees, who came there to meet him. At Detroit he and Campbell, the commander, held councils with the Hurons and Chippewas, and chiefs who came from the River La Roche (Big Miami). Pontiac also appeared again ; and an “ ancient council fire was now kindled,” as he proclaimed figuratively to the assembly of war- riors, “with dry wood, that the blaze might as- cend to the clouds, so that all nations might see it, and know that you live in peace and tranquil- lity with your fathers, the English.”
In this accidental manner the conversion of the tribes of the Northwest to the British interest and allegiance was brought about far more quickly and efficaciously than Sir William Johnson or Croghan had planned. This “ covenant chain” remained unbroken for thirty years. Detroit, under the British flag, continued to be the centre of control over the Indian tribes in all the terri- tory down to the Ohio River, except that part on the Muskingum and Cuyahoga which was tribu- tary to Fort Pitt.
British interests, however, were much vexed from Demoiselle’s old haunts at Piqua. The fort had disappeared during the war, but the trading post established by Peter Loramie, a hostile Frenchman, about 1769, near by on the western branch of the Big Miami (Loramie’s Fork), be- came a noted resort of all malcontent Indians for procuring arms and making mischief.
But the irrepressible conflict between the In-
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dians and the squatters and outcasts, who had begun to congregate on the Monongahela before Pontiac’s rebellion, now broke out anew. It may be called also the era of the land com- panies. Besides the Ohio Company, which had been dormant during the war, two other associa- tions of Virginians, known as the Loyal and the Greenbriar companies, had been formed in 1749 and 1750 upon the promise in the king’s name of immense grants of lands in western Virginia. All these companies had been suppressed by the war, and still more effectually by the king’s pro- clamation interdicting all further land operations west of the mountains.
But the proclamation admitted of a loophole through the king’s special license, and this was the opening through which these and other asso- ciations, displaying the names of many distin- guished men of the time, now began to work. The strain which was brought to bear by these influ- ences upon the king and council became severe. Sir William Johnson had set a bad precedent by accepting a gift of 40,000 acres of land in New York from the Mohawks. The most formidable of the associations was the Walpole Companj7, named from a member of that family who was at the head of it. It was brought into public notice by a pamphlet issued at London in 1763, entitled “ The Advantages of a Settlement upon the Ohio.”
Some measure now became necessary, at least
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as to that part of the coveted territory south and southeast of the Ohio River, to relieve it from the embarrassment caused by the proclamation, which practically discriminated in favor of these projectors of new colonies. The result was the treaty of Fort Stanwix (Rome, N. Y.), in No- vember, 1768, the importance of which in West- ern history has been much overlooked. The change to which it eventually led, not only in boundaries but in jurisdiction, makes it particu- larly material to the history of Ohio. A brief outline of its origin and provisions will suffice.
Sir William Johnson and his deputy, Croghan, who had leave of absence probably for the pur- pose, in March, 1764, submitted to the Board of Trade at London the importance of constructing a division and boundary between the colonies and the Indians further west. Croghan proposed a line to be run from the heads of the river Dela- ware to the mouth of the Ohio. The Lords of Trade and Plantations, however, recommended that the disposition of the Indians be first sounded. This Sir William Johnson proceeded to do by inviting a conference with the Six Na- tions; for he had a delusive notion that they were the monarchs and proprietors of the West. The sachems, after gravely listening to the proposal, took a day, according to Indian etiquette, to con- sider it, and then made themselves ridiculous, as Sir William told them, by proposing a line from Lake Champlain across to the heads of the Sus-
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quebanna ; not the line, by any means, which the movers in this enterprise desired. On second consideration they came nearer the mark by offer- ing the line of the Ohio River from the mouth of the Tennessee up to Adigo (Kittanning), on the Alleghany, thence to Shamokin on the Susque- hanna, and up that river and its eastern branch to Owego. This, Sir William thought, would do for the present. In his concluding speech he took pains to refer to it as offered of their own free will, and exhorted them to be faithful to their engagement, for the French and Spanish were already busy in stirring up the opposition of the western Indians. To this the Onondaga speaker, an important functionary, replied that they had the matter much at heart, and would acquaint the nations at the Ohio of their resolution at a public meeting in the Shawanees country, where these nations held their councils, and did not doubt of reconciling all of them to it. This ought to have been sufficient to apprise Sir William Johnson of the fallacious ground upon which he was proceed- ing.
Some of these tribes, the Senecas, Delawares, and Shawanees, had just been in council with him, as they had promised at their meeting with General Bouquet in the previous year. Croghan also had been in conference with them in May, 1768, at Fort Pitt. But no allusion to the new boundary had been made on either of these occa- sions. It was observed, moreover, in this confer-
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ence at Fort Pitt, that the Shawanees, in presence of Croghan and the deputies of the Six Nations, boldly asserted that the country down the Ohio was owned by the tribes living there, and they called upon the Pennsylvania commissioners to stop their people from going there until these tribes were spoken to.
Sir William Johnson’s success with the Six Nations gave a new impulse to the land compa- nies. The Walpole Company had been revived in 1766, with Governor Franklin of New Jersey at the head, and Sir William among its promoters. Dr. Franklin, the governor’s father, was in Lon- don at the time, and the company obtained his agency in an endeavor to secure the grant. The territory which they sought lay on the east side of the Ohio, extending from a point opposite the Scioto up to the Pennsylvania line, and was to be bounded on the south by a line passing from Cumberland Gap northeasterly to the confluence of New River with the Greenbriar, and thence to the Alleghany ridge. This would have shut Vir- ginia out of the valley of the Kanawha. Dr. Franklin pressed the application, but owing to a change of ministry it was suspended some years.
Another colony of still larger proportions was projected in 1766. In this also the names of the Franklins and Sir William Johnson appeared, with those of General Gage and some leading fur- traders at Philadelphia. Their proposal was for all the territory between the Ohio, the Mississippi,
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and the Wabash, to be bounded on the north by a line extending from the mouth of the river Wisconsin to the mouth of the Maumee. This plan was easily defeated by Lord Hillsborough, then head of the Lords of Trade and Plantations, who was the uncompromising opponent of all the companies.
The most formidable resistance to these enter- prises arose from the claimants of the military bounty lands promised by the proclamation of 1763, and by Governor Dinwiddie’s guaranty in 1754, of a grant of two hundred thousand acres to the officers and soldiers who went out under Washington to resist the French. Washington, for himself and these claimants, urged all his in- fluence against the monopolies proposed, and by letters addressed to Governors Botetourt and Dunmore and other authorities, obtained for his men large grants in the Kanawha valley under Dinwiddie’s pledge.
But another set of land operators was at work during this contention, whose proceedings ad- mitted of no further postponements of the boun- dary question. Without regard to the king’s proclamation, or the savages, the frontier people, chiefly Virginians from the Potomac, had crossed the mountains and built their cabins on Cheat River, and as far down as Redstone (Brownsville) on the Monongahela. This action created the ut- most hostility among the Indians. General Gage ordered the settlers to be expelled, and in the
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winter of 1766-67 addressed sharp remonstrances to the governors of Pennsylvania and Virginia. He warned them that the certain consequence of these lawless outrages by their people would be another carnage on their frontier. But he might as well have forbidden the fish to swim down the Ohio. The squatters paid no attention to his au- thority.
The provincial authorities in Virginia, however, were alarmed by advices that John Stuart, the king’s superintendent of Indian affairs at the south, was treating with the Cherokees for another boundary, which would restrict the province as seriously as the Walpole colony. This “ minis- terial line,” as it was called, had in fact been settled between the Board of Trade and the Cher- okees before the treaty of Fort Stanwix, extending from the mouth of the Kanawha south to Chis- well’s Mine, on the line of North Carolina, and thence through the Carolinas and Georgia to the St. John’s River in Florida. It was in view of this danger that Virginia now took a close interest in the Fort Stanwix business.
The king’s order in council to Sir William Johnson, January 5, 1768, was explicit that “the boundary line between the several provinces and the various Indian tribes be completed without loss of time, conformably with the report of the Board of Trade, and that he consult the gover- nors of the different provinces concerning such points as may affect them separately.” The re-
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port of the Board of Trade, March 7, 1768, with which he, as commissioner, was thus ordered to conform, referred to the “establishment of cer- tain new colonies.” They recommended that the king adopt the boundary laid down upon the map annexed to the report, which was plainly marked as extending from Owegy at the east to the mouth of the Connahway (Kanawha) at the west, and there turning south to Florida ; in other words, adopting Stuart’s or the “ministerial line.” The order in council related not only to the In- dian boundary, but also to the boundaries to be set between the old colonies and the new ones contemplated.
A large concourse of people, Indian and white, attended the treaty convention, October 24th, at Fort Stanwix. Together with Sir William John- son as the king’s representative, Franklin, the governor of New Jersey, Richard Peters and James Tilghman, commissioners for Pennsylvania, and Thomas Walker, commissioner for Virginia, took part in it. “ Sundry Gents from different colonies” also attended, as the official report quaintly adds. Dr. Walker was the first to pre- sent his credentials from the governor of Virginia, expressly authorizing him “ to be commissioner of Virginia to settle a boundary line between this colony and the colonies of Pennsylvania and Maryland, and the several nations of Indians concerned.” The Pennsylvania commissioners were in like manner accredited.
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Without wading through days of tedious cere- mony and speech-making, it need only be said that on the 1st of November the deputies of the Six Nations, with the map before them, announced as their final resolve that the boundary line between them and the British colonies should begin at the mouth of the Cherokee (Tennessee) River, then go along the southeast side of the Ohio to Kittan- ning, from thence to the head of the west branch of the Susquehanna and so on to Owegy, as origi- nally proposed, but now extending it so as to ter- minate at Wood Creek, near the fort. This they offered in consideration of <£10,460 Is. 3 cZ., to be paid by the king to the Six Nations. A deed of cession, accordingly, “ to their Sovereign lord and King George Third, his heirs and successors, to and for his and their own proper use and behoof,” was formally executed by the chiefs of the con- federacy November 5th, and attested by Sir Wil- liam Johnson, the governor of New Jersey, and the commissioners of Pennsylvania and Virginia. At the same time, and as part of the treaty, sepa- rate grants were made to Pennsylvania in consid- eration of ten thousand dollars for all the territory west of the Susquehanna, besides certain tracts to Croghan and others as gifts of the Six Nations.
It was altogether an extraordinary transaction. The boundary established was in direct violation of the order in council, and the line agreed upon with the Cherokees. Virginia, instead of being cooped up by the “ ministerial line,” gained the
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whole of Kentucky. The material point at pres- ent, however, is, that the north boundary of west- ern Virginia, as thus fixed by her own procure- ment and consent, was limited to the southeast side of the Ohio River, or the south side, as ex- pressed in the deed. The cession to Pennsylvania was equally conclusive upon all the parties. The king at once disapproved the treaty, but did not disavow it ; such was the powerful hold which, in Indian affairs, Sir William Johnson had upon the government. In his report enclosing the treaty, he vindicated himself on the ground that the Six Nations had insisted that they, and not the Chero- kees, owned the Ohio down to the Tennessee, and would not be satisfied unless their cession extended there. But he advanced a more singular apology, that “ he was only concerned lest the Virginians, especially those on the frontier, should take pos- session and begin settlements on these lands,” south of the Ohio. Many persons, of consequence, he added, were induced to promote these frontier people ; and in support of this he intimated that u he saw a deed in the hands of the Virginia com- missioners for great part of these lands, which they assured me had formerly met with encourage- ment from his late Majesty and the then ministry, of which numbers were determined to avail them- selves forthwith. This did not a little contribute to induce me to accept the cession of the country, to prevent the general ill consequences which must attend such settlements without the Indians’ consent.” '
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The apocryphal deed so effectively used has never come to light, but the “ Virginia commis- sioners ” evidently had the upper hand in adjust- ing the boundary. The king yielded to these persuasive reasons, and in December, 1769, rati- fied the treaty, except as to the private grants to Croghan and others, which were rejected. They were afterwards urged upon Congress, but with- out avail.
The land companies now redoubled their exer- tions at London. In December a new one, styled the Mississippi Company, composed of forty-nine leading Virginians, Colonel George Washington among them, sent a petition to the king for a grant of two and a half million acres of land be- tween the mountains and the lately established boundary. This petition was referred by the Privy Council to the Lords of Trade and Planta- tions, and there it disappears. But the Walpole Company was more successful. In spite of Lord Hillsborough’s strenuous opposition, Dr. Frank- lin’s appeal for the new colony, the ablest tract it has been said which he ever wrote, was so effec- tive that by an order in council, August 14, 1772, a grant was authorized of the whole territory southeast of the Ohio, from the Pennsylvania line down to a point opposite the mouth of the Scioto ; “to the end,” it was declared, “ that the same may be settled, and such settlement and district erected into a separate government, as the Board of Trade shall advise and the King approve.”
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Virginia would thus have lost the opening she had gained at Fort Stanwix. The order in coun- cil in favor of the Walpole Company was trans- mitted to Sir William Johnson, that he might obtain the consent of the Six Nations, according to his established routine. About the same time a compromise was effected between the Walpole and the Ohio companies, and the latter was merged in the former. But in the revolutionary storm now impending, both of them perished, and Virginia took quiet possession of the field of all this rivalry and intrigue, to which she had sub- mitted without opposition or complaint. But be- sides arousing the land speculators, the treaty of Fort Stanwix had set the Indian tribes beyond the Ohio in a blaze of jealousy by depriving them of a voice or of any share in the largess unduly bestowed, as they thought, upon the Six Nations. A still worse cause of exasperation was the horde of borderers of the baser sort thus incited to move down upon the rich lands south of the Ohio, and who scrupled not to cross the river and exer- cise their lawless rapacity there also. These sav- ages regarded Indians as having no rights, and killed them as indifferently as they would snakes.
The deadly struggle thus aroused, as the French had foretold, soon settled down into a twenty years’ war, fought by the Indians to save the line of the Ohio itself. The Shawanees took the lead in continuous raids, murders, and robberies north and south of the river. At the general congress
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of the western tribes which was held at the Scioto Plains (Pickaway) in the summers of 1771, 1772, 1773, successively, they strove to reunite these tribes in a general war of extermination upon the English. Sir William Johnson, having been somewhat censured by Lord Hillsborough for misleading the ministry in respect to the rela- tions between the western tribes and the Six Nations, sent deputies who succeeded in detach- ing the more distant tribes ; but the Shawanees, Wyandots, Senecas, and a majority of the Dela- wares, persisted in their hostility. In this way all were easily converted by the English commandant at Detroit and his emissaries, during the Revo- lutionary War, into unrelenting enemies of the colonies. One of the calamities resulting from it was the destruction of the Moravian missions on the Muskingum.
It was believed that the war of Lord Dunmore and the Virginians against the Shawanees in 1774 was not merely to punish them for their retalia- tion for the murder of Logan’s relations and other Indians on the upper Ohio that summer, though that ostensibly was his object. Some obscurity must remain until Lord Dunmore’s papers, and the contemporaneous documents in the state paper archives at London, are more fully brought to light. Not only the butchery and captures by the Indians in the back parts of Virginia for years, and the ugly dispute between Virginia and Penn- sylvania about the territory at the head of the
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Ohio commenced by Dinwiddie,but also the grow- ing difficulties between the crown and the colo- nies, which at this time were becoming critical, may all have furnished him with motives. It was the firm belief of Virginians, including many of Dunmore’s officers and men, that the expedition was contrived with a deliberate intention of sacri- ficing them and gaining favor with the savages, in order that these might aid the mother country in the event of a war. The justice of this suspicion seems doubtful, from the fact that the Virginia convention, in March, 1775, passed a vote of “ cor- dial thanks to their worthy Governor, Lord Dun- more, for his truly noble, wise, and spirited conduct in the late expedition against our Indian enemy.” General Andrew Lewis and Colonel Christian, two of his officers, were members of that conven- tion.
The plan for this invasion of Ohio was, that General Lewis, with three regiments, should de- scend the Kanawha, and be joined at the mouth of that river by Dunmore and his forces, who were to advance from the northern counties by way of the Ohio. Lord Dunmore lost time in dallying with the Senecas and Delawares at Fort Pitt, and dispatched three traders with an order to Lewis to march immediately for the Chillicothe towns (Scioto), Dunmore intending to land at the mouth of the Hockhocking, and march to the same point. Lewis received the express October 9th, but at sunrise the next morning was stormed in his camp
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by the confederate Shawanees, Delawares, and Mingoes, commanded by Cornstalk, the great war chief of the Shawanees. They had silently crossed the river in the night. Lewis’s scouts for four days had discovered no sign of them. All that day a desperate battle was fought by the Virgin- ians, who were hemmed in between the two riv- ers. At dark the Indians retired as noiselessly as they had come, having discovered the approach of a fresh regiment from Fincastle.
Dunmore and his weaker force, after throwing up a fortification at the mouth of the Hockhock- ing, were permitted to march undisturbed to Sippo Creek, a tributary of the Scioto (near the line between Ross and Pickaway counties), and there, at his fortified camp (Charlotte), had re- ceived the submission of the Shawanees. Their messengers, suing for peace, had set out to meet him at the Hockhocking, whilst Cornstalk -was executing his quick flanking stroke at the other wing. In skill and strategy, nothing superior to this had occurred in Indian warfare.
The approach of Lewis to Camp Charlotte was discovered by the savages with terror. Dunmore sent an express to inform him of the pacification, and with orders to return to Virginia. Lewis, it is said, continued to advance until met by Dun- more in person, with his staff. He then halted, in bitter disappointment, and fell back to Fort Gower, at the mouth of the Hockhocking, whether by himself, or together with Dunmore’s force, does not appear.
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Here, on the banks of the Ohio, November 5, 1774, at a meeting of officers “ for the purpose of considering the grievances of British America,” emanated the following resolutions, afterward published in the “ Virginia Gazette ” : —
“ Resolved , That we will bear the most faith- ful allegiance to his Majesty King George the Third whilst his Majesty delights to reign over a free people ; that we will at the expense of life and everything dear and valuable exert ourselves in support of the honor of his Crown and the dig- nity of the British Empire. But as the love of liberty and attachment to the real interests and just rights of America outweigh every other con- sideration, we resolve that we will exert every power within us for the defense of American lib- erty, and for the support of her just rights and privileges ; not in any precipitate, riotous, or tu- multuous manner, but when regularly called forth by the unanimous voice of our countrymen.
“ Resolved , That we entertain the greatest re- spect for his Excellency the Right Honorable Lord Dunmore, who commanded the expedition against the Shawanese, and who we are confident underwent the great fatigue of this singular cam- paign from no other motive than the true in- terest of this country.”
Lord Dunmore’s treaty, as it is commonly styled, was really no treaty. It was agreed that he should meet the deputies of these tribes at Fort Pitt in the following spring for the purpose
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of forming one. By that time he was involved in deeper troubles. The campaign accomplished but little. The Indians promised to surrender their captives and plunder, and that they would not hunt or make any more predatory incursions" south of the Ohio. The Mingoes attempted to evade the issue by stealing off, but were over- taken by a strong detachment under Major Craw- ford at the salt lick town (Franklin County), and severely punished.
Several characters figured in this campaign who afterwards became notable. Besides General Lewis and his colonels, there were younger men, such as Daniel Morgan, George Rogers Clark, William Crawford, Simon Kenton, and Simon Girty. It was on this occasion also, and at Camp Charlotte, that Lord Dunmore received the cele- brated speech of Logan, the Mingo warrior ; the little gem of natural eloquence which was repro- duced by Mr. Jefferson, in his u Notes on Vir- ginia,” as “ challenging whole orations of Demos- thenes and Cicero, or any more eminent orator, if Europe has furnished any, to produce a passage superior to it.” Notwithstanding Mr. Luther Martin’s rude aspersions in gratifying his feeling against Mr. Jefferson, the authenticity of the speech is clearly traceable, though its genuineness may have been marred by over-zealous translators or copyists.
Logan took no part in the conferences, but was sulking near by. Girty was sent to him by Lord
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Dunmore with a special invitation, but failed to bring him. Colonel Gibson was then sent, and through him the speech was returned. Kenton and Girty had once been comrades at Fort Pitt, and now renewed their acquaintance. Four years later it took a dramatic turn, in which Logan also had a part, and it is worthy of note as furnish- ing the last that is known of this singular being. Kenton, in 1778, was captured by the Shawanees in one of his scouting excursions, and being doomed to the stake was taken to Wapatomica, on Mad River. Girty happened to come there, and, seeing the prisoner with his face blackened, demanded his name. On discovering that it was Kenton, the hardened savage, usually regarded as relentless, embraced him and wept aloud, assuring him he would save him if he could. He caused the coun- cil to be reassembled and made a speech, which Kenton, eagerly watching the countenances of his judges, could see was moving them. Girty, when he concluded, received a unanimous grunt of ap- proval. He took Kenton to the store of the Brit- ish traders, and fitting him out with new clothing, horse and saddle, rode with him around the neigh- boring towns for some days, receiving congratu- lations. By ill luck a war party came in, which had lost severely in a fight with the whites. Ken- ton was demanded as a victim of their vengeance, and no entreaties of Girty could save him. But as a favor to Girty the council agreed that the burning should be at Upper Sandusky, then the
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place for payment of British annuities, gifts, and favors.
At the crossing of the Scioto, where Logan at this time had his cabin, the guard stopped over- night. Happily the great chief was at home, and in course of the night visited Kenton. In the morning he detained the guard, and informed Kenton that he had sent two young men ahead to speak a good word for him at Sandusky. When the guard set off the next day, Logan shook hands with the prisoner at parting, but said nothing as to his fate. On arriving at San- dusky they were met by the whole Indian popu- lation, but Kenton was spared from running the gauntlet. The council assembled for his fourth ordeal, and was about to consign him to execution, when Peter Druyer, a Canadian captain in the British service, a man of influence and much tact with the Indians, and noted for his humanity, appeared in full uniform. This was Logan’s de- vice, and it had complete success. Druyer in a flattering speech applauded the Indians for their great success against the Americans, the cause of all this bloody and distressing war. No punish- ment could be too severe. But this prisoner was a man of the very utmost importance to the com- mandant at Detroit. He possessed information of more value to the allies for conducting the war than the lives of twenty ordinary prisoners. He urged, therefore, that Kenton be sent to Detroit for examination first, and then brought back for
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his doom. As his captors had been put to great trouble, Captain Druyer supplemented his speech by offering them one hundred dollars at once, in tobacco, rum, etc., assuring them of his confidence that the commandant would, on delivery of the prisoner to him, increase it to their entire satis- faction.
Kenton was sent on to Detroit, and the com- mandant, it is needless to say, had no difficulty in sending the guard back quite contented without him. If McDonald is right as to the time of this occurrence, the commandant must have been Hamilton, who was himself the prisoner of George Rogers Clark a year later.
While the Dunmore campaign was going on, the first Continental Congress had met at Phila- delphia, and sent forth their memorable mani- festoes of grievances. Another event had occurred earlier in the year, unknown to Lord Dunmore, which totally changed the political status and re- lations of the country which he had been invad- ing. Parliament, on June 22d, had passed an act “ making more effectual provision for the govern- ment of the Province of Quebec,” hence known as the Quebec Act. By this the whole country bounded by the Ohio, the Mississippi, and the lakes west of the west line of Pennsylvania, was annexed and made part of that province.
The declared object of this measure was to ex- tend the boundaries and government of Quebec, so as to secure and satisfy the French inhabitants
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at Kaskaskias, the Wabash, and Detroit. They had remained there under faith in the pledges given to them by the king in the Treaty of Paris and the proclamation of 1763, but had for ten years been left without any civil government or privileges whatever. Moreover, the provisions made for the Quebec government in the procla- mation had been found inapplicable to its people and circumstances; the French being wholly un- used to popular representation and other English institutions, and particularly averse to trial by jury. All this was changed, and the administra- tion committed to the governor and council and the courts, to be conducted according to the sys- tem of laws and local tribunals established in Canada. Judge Burnet observes that the French in Michigan, under the Ordinance of 1787, com- plained loudly of the American courts and their slow, tedious proceedings, with juries and inter- preters to speak for the witnesses.
The Quebec Act extended to all inhabitants of the province the free exercise and enjoyment of the religion of the Church of Rome, subject nevertheless to the king’s supremacy. The clergy of that church were to have their accustomed dues and rights with respect to such persons only as professed that religion ; provision being reserved also for such maintenance of the Protestant clergy as the king should deem expedient and necessary.
This act was denounced, in and out of Parlia-
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ment, as arbitrary and dangerous ; and yet, though debated by the most eminent men in both houses, was suffered to pass, by the insignificant vote of fifty-six against twenty in the House of Com- mons, and twenty-six against seven in the House of Lords. One of these seven was Lord Chatham, who assailed it as 44 a child of inordinate power,” and, holding up the religious part to the bench of bishops, he asked if any of them 64 would hold it out for baptism.” The Continental Congress also viewed it in that light ; not quite the spirit of tolerance which might have been expected of the Sons of Liberty, animated in some degree, perhaps, with the temper of sour grapes. Mo- tives in politics do not always bear inspection.
The truth was that Parliament, by the Quebec Act, simply made good what the king had prom- ised in 1763, in order to prevent a general exodus of the French of Canada, Detroit, and Illinois to Louisiana ; and this new government, like that which was temporarily imposed by the Ordinance of 1787, was well adapted to an immense country with no population. Such an unexampled con- cession of religious liberty placed Parliament at an advantage. Even though the motive were to divide the French from the English colonies in the rising insurrection, it must be admitted to have been a legitimate measure of policy.
Ohio was now transferred back to its old con- nection with Canada, and so remained until the treaty of independence in 1783. The jurisdiction
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was but nominal, and wholly military. Prior to the Ordinance of 1787 there is no trace of a magistrate or civil officer in Ohio, either French, English, or American, unless it were those of the “ squatter sovereigns ” on the Upper Ohio, to be mentioned in another chapter.
CHAPTER YI.
THE MORAVIANS.
The villages planted by the Moravian mission- aries on the banks of the Tuscarawas River, in 1772, are fairly entitled to rank as the first settle- ments in Ohio. Numbers of white people inhab- ited the country before them, but without law or order ; unknown to the world, and even to each other. Many a “ first white child” had been born in these wilds before the little Moravians, John Lewis Rothe, 1773, and Joanna Heckwelder, 1781. They, however, were but waifs and strays, the place of whose nativity “ knoweth them no more.” The claim formerly made for Marietta as the earliest settlement, is clearly incorrect. In legal phrase, it is estopped by its own record. The grant by Congress to the Ohio Company in July, 1787, which included Marietta, and the ordinance in 1785 by which the first surveys and disposal of the Western lands was directed, expressly excepted and reserved the Moravian villages and the lands surrounding them, ten thousand acres in all, for the Christian Indians u formerly settled there.” The title was vested by the United States in the Moravian Brethren at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania,
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for civilizing the Indians and promoting Chris- tianity.
The Moravians thus were not only officially recognized as settlers, but the irregularity of their possession, which has been supposed technically to debar the recognition of them as settlers, was removed. The gift was subsequently enlarged to twelve thousand acres, and in 1823 was all recon- veyed to the United States, the churchyards, cemeteries, and a few special leases excepted.
The Moravian Church arose far back in the reaction of the Waldenses and Bohemians, prior to the Reformation. The Hussite War had led to inhuman excesses on both sides. A little sect in Bohemia and Moravia, turning aside from these bloody contentions, humbly sought a purer doc- trine and worship, and attempted, with what light they had, to frame their faith upon the love and law of Christ, styling themselves Fratres Legis Christi . But as this bore the appearance of a monastic order, they adopted the name of the United Brethren, “ Unitas Fratrum .” The “ daily Word ” was the feature and guide of their daily life. It was a text from the gospels for each day’s meditation, and the striking coincidences which turned upon this book are much referred to in their histories. Another peculiarity which they adopted from the primitive Christians was that of submitting to lot all questions likely to breed contention, believing this to be the will of God.
Their church government was episcopal. Their
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tenets were few and simple ; binding them to a circumspect life and discipline, and especially call- ing on them to bear all things for conscience’ sake. Instead of defending themselves by force and arms, as the Hussites had done, the height of their faith was to rely upon prayer and remon- strance only, against the rage of their enemies. They refused to perform military duty and to take oaths in court. It is a harsh reflection upon human nature, but wherever they went, this be- came the chief cause of their misfortunes. They made little account of other dogmas, but welcomed all who trusted with them in the merits and suf- ferings of Jesus. Every trait in His character and life was dwelt upon in their devout contem- plations. They sought especially to awaken re- ligious sensibilities by holding up the crucifixion and suffering, by the liveliest and most ardent pictures of fancy. These passionate appeals, and the sweet devotional poetry and music which they cultivated so highly, contributed in no small degree to deepen such impressions. The faith they sought to implant was mainly through love.
To go in this panoply before the wild Indians of America, it must be admitted, was proof of great faith, and the seeming incongruity required thus much to be said of them. Strangely, the direction thus taken, and the sensibilities thus appealed to, proved to be precisely adapted to the Indian nature, and had a power which, under different circumstances, might have made a dif- ferent history for the red man.
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Guided by Count Zinzendorf as bishop, they adopted foreign missions as their vocation, send- ing their preachers to Greenland, to the West Indies, and in 1735 to Georgia. But Ogle- thorpe’s border war with the Spaniards compelled him to call every man in his colony to arms, and the Moravians, rather than forsake their princi- ples, abandoned their lands and escaped to Penn- sylvania. Here some of their brethren were al- ready fixed. Among the refugees was the young David Zeisberger, the future head of the Ohio missions. Bethlehem on the Lehigh became, and is yet, the centre in America of their double sys- tem of missions and education. They bought lands, laid out villages and farms, built houses, shops, and mills, but everywhere, and first of all, houses of prayer, in thankfulness for the peace and prosperity at length found.
The first mission established by Zinzendorf in the colonies was in 1741, among the Mohican In- dians, near the borders of New York and Con- necticut. The bigoted people and authorities of the neighborhood by outrages and persecution drove them off, so that they were forced to take refuge on the Lehigh. The brethren established them in a new colony twenty miles above Beth- lehem, to which they gave the name of Gnaden- hiitten (Tents of Grace).
The prosperity of the Mohicans attracted the attention and visits of the Indians beyond. The nearest were the Delawares, between whom and
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the Mohicans there were strong ties of affinity, as branches of the old Lenni Lenape stock. Rela- tions were thus formed between the Moravians and the Delawares. And by the fraternization between the Delawares and Shawanees already referred to, and their gradual emigration to the West to escape the encroachments of Penn’s peo- ple, it occurred that the Moravian missionaries, Zeisberger foremost, accompanied their Dela- ware and Mohican converts to the Susquehanna in 1765, and again, when driven from there by the cession at Fort Stanwix, journeyed with them across the Alleghanies to Gosligoshink, a town established by the unconverted Delawares far up the Alleghany River.
Here heathen conjurers and preachers were practicing abominations, which in Zeisberger’s eyes showed that Satan had chosen this place as his throne. He and his Indian assistants also preached, denouncing their falsehoods and decep- tions with most fearless severity. Zeisberger would then turn to the Indians, and melt them to tears by his vivid pictures, in their own language, of the mercy and grace which was in store for repentant sinners. One of these scenes was made the subject of Schussele’s historical painting “The Power of the Gospel.” These persuasive appeals, and such hymns, also in the Delaware language, as never before had reverberated among the hills of the Alleghany, brought numbers of visitors to hear and see this new worship.
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One of these became the most distinguished of the converts and supporters of the missions in Ohio. This was Glickhican, a leader of the Dela- ware warriors, who by his captivating address and power of speech had become the chief counselor and orator of Pakanke, chief of the Wolf clan of Delawares at Kuskuskee, on Big Beaver Creek. He had heard of Zeisberger’s victory over the sorcerers at Gosgosliink, and now came pur- posely to silence him.
He and some brother chiefs who came with him to witness the triumph were entertained at dinner by the Indian brother Anthony, who was also burning for this combat, and could not re- press a few well chosen words as to sin and salva- tion. Glickhican was impressed with his earnest- ness, but without any reply went to the daily meeting. And now occurred a phenomenon which still puzzles most men, and was more than the superstition of an Indian could bear.
As he entered, he suddenly conceived that the very scene he now beheld had appeared to him before : Indians with plain hair, without rings in their noses, assembled in a large room ; in their midst a short white man, who, presenting him a book, desired him to read, and upon his replying that he could not read, the white man had said, “ After you have been with us a while, you will learn how to read it.” Therefore, on entering the room and seeing the Indian congregation, and a short white man (Zeisberger) holding a book,
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all answering the vision he had seen or dreamed, he was overcome with astonishment and retired. On returning to Kuskuskee he related this dis- comfiture to his brother warriors, and they were equally confounded.
The Moravians were invited by Pakanke, in a few months, to come to the Big Beaver ; and in April, 1770, transferred themselves to their new home, to which they gave the name of Frieden- stadt. But now, besides the enmity of the sorcer- ers, they encountered a storm of wrath from Pa- kanke, caused by Glickhican deserting and joining himself to the Moravians as a convert. His old companions on the war-path, as well as the chief, were implacable. Pakanke taunted his late cap- tain and counselor with ingratitude. “ Were you not a brave,” he exclaimed, “ and honored by sit- ting next to me in council ? And now you pre- tend to despise all this, and think you have found something better. Some time or other you will find you were mistaken.” Glickhican bore it quietly and replied : “ I have gone over to them, and with them I will live or die.”
To remove the prejudice that had been formed, the Moravians declared that, though their con- verts renounced war and hostile expeditions, they would willingly contribute a full share of the general burden and expense attending the welfare of the Delawares in time of peace. They imposed as a condition, however, that the council and their chiefs and captains must claim
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no authority over the missionaries, but leave them, and those who should come from Bethlehem to fill their places, full liberty to come and go where they pleased.
This amend, probably suggested by Glickhican, gave great satisfaction. The Monsys, on the Alleghany, sent a deputy to inform the Wolf tribe, on the Beaver, that they had adopted and naturalized the Moravian brethren as Delawares, desiring Pakanke to confirm the message and send it forward to the western Delawares, and the Shawanees also, that the covenant might be duly kept. Pakanke complied, and relented so far as to depute the messenger to go back to the Susquehanna, and invite all the Christian Indians to come out to Kuskuskee, and build a town where they pleased.
But though the chiefs were conciliated, the hos- tility of the warriors and populace increased. It was discovered in fact that the Moravian colony had run into the toils of the men who were their deadliest enemies. The Beaver and the Upper Ohio had long been the stronghold of the lowest class of traders, who abhorred the Moravian mis- sions as fatal to their interests, especially as re- gards the traffic in spirits. A more miscreant and corrupt horde, in general, probably never defiled the earth. Uncontrolled by the provincial governors, — indeed, rather patronized by most of them “ in the interest of trade,” — their horse trains, laden with rum, could gain access where
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other white men dared not go. Among their frauds, they propagated the report among the Indians that Zeisberger intended to sell his con- verts to the Cherokees as slaves.
These adversities determined the Moravians to plunge a step further into the wilderness, and go to the head chief of the Delawares at Gepelemuk- pechenk (Stillwater, or Tuscarawi) on the Mus- kingum. It was near this village that Christian Frederick Post, the brave, enterprising pioneer of the Moravians, had established himself in 1761, with the approbation of the chiefs, after two important embassies among them as agent for the governor of Pennsylvania. By marriage with an Indian wife he had forfeited his regular standing with the congregation. His intimate acquaintance with the Indians, and their languages and cus- toms, so far gained upon them that in 1762 he was permitted to take Heckewelder to share his cabin and establish a school for the Indian chil- dren. But in the autumn the threatened outburst of Pontiac’s war had compelled them to flee.
The Delawares, it is to be remembered, were of three tribes or totems — the Turtle, the Turkey (Monsys), and the Wolf. On the Alleghany and Beaver they were chiefly Monsys. On the Mus- kingum they were of the Turtle and Wolf min- gled. Old Netawatwes (New-comer), the chief at Tuscarawi, was now head chief of the nation.
Zeisberger and his Indian assistants were well received by him, and by most of his council. He
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gained his point, but the chiefs were not of one accord, as will unhappily appear all along until the end. Early in the following year (1772) the colony was invited by the council at Tuscarawi, the Wyandots west of them approving it, to come with all their Indian brethren from the Alle- ghany and Susquehanna, and settle on the Mus- kingum (as the Tuscarawas was then called), and upon any lands that they might choose.
The United Brethren, east and west, took coun- sel together, and obeying this call, as they inter- preted it, Zeisberger and some of the assistants, who were the executive and police department in the little state now forming, were sent over to the Tuscarawas in March to spy out the land. They entered at the beautiful stretch on the east- ern bank between Tuscarawi and the confluence of the Wahlhonding and the Tuscarawas rivers, which Gist had traversed in 1750, and Bouquet’s army in 1764. The prospect filled them with delight. The rich soil, the fine timber, a large spring, which they specially admired, and the great abundance of game, afforded all the indica- tions most to be sought for in an Indian colony.
Journeying onward some twenty miles up the river from where they had entered, they came to the Delaware capital. Their gratitude to the chiefs for the boon they had offered was fitly acknowledged, and on venturing to state the choice of land they would like, if permitted, there was a mutual pleasure on discovering that it was
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the very same which the Delawares were intend- ing for them. The chiefs gave them some miles on the eastern bank, between their village and Stillwater Creek, with the guaranty that no other Indians should intrude there, and that there should be no molestation of the Christian Indians or the missionaries, or of any persons attending their worship. The Moravians established a con- dition, of equal force, that no white settlers should be admitted but those associated in the missions.
The pioneer party, in the removal from the Beaver to Ohio, consisted of Zeisberger and five Indian families, twenty-eight persons, who arrived at this beautiful ground May 3, 1772. Words could not tell the devout jov of the missionary and his little flock on alighting at this long- sought refuge, as they trusted it was to be. The clearing of the forest, and erection of temporary cabins, began the next day ; and what shows the growth of these neophytes in tilth and thrift, as well as in grace, it was but a few weeks before they had fields and gardens of the fresh soil sown with crops of grain and vegetables, and the town commenced. The site was at the large spring, and appropriately it was named for it Shoenbrun.1
1 Shoenbrun (beautiful spring) was about two miles southeast of New Philadelphia. The centenary year of the settlement was celebrated appropriately. Mr. Jacob, the owner of the spring, dedicated it, with the large elm overhanging it, to the Union Bi- ble Society, for preservation, and a memorial stone with suitable inscriptions was planted near by it.
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In August arrived the missionaries Ettwein and Heckewelder, with the main body of Christian Indians who had been invited from the Alleghany and the Susquehanna, about two hundred and fifty in number. These sent a delegation up to Tuscarawi to give the chiefs notice of their ar- rival. Their speech of gratitude, and the usual compliments, passed off with perfect success. Zeisberger and an escort of the Indian brethren, also, went down the Muskingum to Waketamika (Dresden), then a Shawanees town, to propitiate their good graces. The Shawanees received them with much respect and favor, and attended Zeis- berger’s preaching in great numbers. Readers of Indian history will distinguish this from another town of the same name on Mad River, and also the several Wappatomicas and Wappakonetas, which, like Chillicothe, were towns of number.
This, and further accessions from the east in September, made it advisable to divide the colony into two villages. The second was established ten miles below Shoenbrun, on a high bank of the river. As it was allotted chiefly to the Mohi- can new-comers, Shoenbrun being occupied by the Delawares, the Mohican village took the name of Gnadenhutten, from their old home on the Le- high. In April, 1773, the remnants of the mis- sion on the Beaver joined their brethren in Ohio. The whole body of the Moravian Indians, so long sundered and scattered by the bigoted per- secutions of white men, was now united and at
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rest under the shelter of the unconverted but more tolerant Delaware warriors.
The plan of Shoenbrun, the other villages being also laid out much in the same way, was a broad street extending from the river into the fields, and another at right angles from this, at some distance from the river. At their intersection stood the church, probably the first built in Ohio, forty feet by thirty in dimensions, made of squared logs and shingled roof, and rising above it a turret mounted with the church-bell. The church, at each of the villages, was the building first completed, and their consecration was made by Zeisberger an occasion of great solemnity. Houses of hewn logs for residences were then erected, at intervals suffi- cient to permit a garden for each, and before winter were ready for occupation. Besides the church, there was in each village a sclioolhouse, and also a long, commodious building for the entertain- ment of Indian visitors and wayfarers in their fashion. Hospitality was a prime virtue of the Moravians, and the plain but abundant fare which their Indian housewives knew how to spread be- fore their guests became famous throughout the border.
The fundamental conditions established be- tween the Moravians and the Delaware chiefs have been stated. Their internal polity, secular as well as spiritual, is worthy of admiration, and in some degree may be inferred from the sketch given of the precepts and example upon which
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the whole Moravian economy was founded. Their circumspection of life was not to be occasional only, but the “ daily word,” and the daily ohurch service, constantly drew their hearts and minds to the one great exemplar whom they followed. They had an external government and policy also, which was managed by the helpers, or “ Na- tional Assistants,” — leading Indian brethren, in consultation with whom the missionaries consti- tuted the council of government. Twenty u rules of the congregation,” which were adopted by this authority, were at the commencement of each year read in public meeting, and required to be adopted by the whole congregation. No new member could gain admission without a solemn promise to conform to them strictly. If any of the congregation gave offense or disturbance, it was the office of the Assistants to admonish the person in a friendly manner. If persistent or re- bellious, it was for them to judge whether or not expulsion should follow. The lands, houses, and crops of the colony were common property. But these rules evidently allowed private property to some extent. u Harm to the cattle, goods, or ef- fects of another subjected the offender to pay damage.” The purchase of goods or articles from warriors, knowing them to have been stolen or plundered, was punished by expulsion.
Besides these cardinal laws there were police regulations as to attendance at church and school, visiting the sick and poor, the levy of contribu-
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tions for the common benefit, etc. The schools were administered with exceeding care, spelling- books and readers being prepared by Zeisberger, and printed in the Delaware language. Village communities of Indians living under restraints and influences like these might have diffused Mr. Matthew Arnold’s creed of “sweetness and light” very far among such tribes as were then inhabit- ing Ohio. The neighboring Indians were soon attracted by this novel scene. It was not by a change of heart only that the brethren counted upon the efficacy of their cause. Through the door and school of industry they sought to draw the Indians to the closer ties of Christian peace, order, and love. A powerful auxiliary behind this, upon which they counted for the consummation of their work, — one always interesting to the sav- age, and which soon gave the Christian Indians a most captivating advantage in the eyes of their savage neighbors, — was that they always had plenty to eat. It was their farms and shops, their industrial training and pursuits, their comfortable houses and homes, along the banks of the Mus- kingum, which attracted the Indian attention. These men, to be sure, would not fight, and this excited wrath and bickerings when war parties were to be raised and they refused to go out. But year by year the hungry, foot-sore warriors, in their marching to and fro, saw these peaceful fields, teeming with harvests and dotted with cattle, horses, and pigs, and were glad to stop and
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swallow their indignation with the hearty fare and welcome always ready for them at the Mora- vian villages. Still more grateful were the sick and wounded laggers, who were often received in the hospital and nursed by the “ single sisters.” These intrusions were not unwelcome to the brethren, but rather courted. It was their policy to attract visitors, as these never failed, such was the responsive courtesy of the Indian, to attend the daily meetings, hear the daily word, and watch the effects of its teaching. A passing war party, in distress, was invited into one of the villages and supplied with food and other necessi- ties. The captain declared his surprise. He was from a great distance, and had heard a very differ- ent story. “ At the Delaware village they made wry faces at us,” he said, “ but here the men, women, and children all have made us welcome.”
A visitor of another character dropped in at Shoenbrun in 1773, — the Rev. David Jones, him- self a missionary, sent to the West by the Baptist Church in New Jersey. But his different experi- ence with the Indians illustrated the superiority of the Moravian method. The journal of this eccentric worthy, who finally became an army chap- lain under General Wayne, gives an interesting account of his two circuits of “ missionating ” in Ohio in the years 1772 and 1773. In the first he descended the Ohio as far as the Kanawha, in company with George Rogers Clark and other land prospectors. His second tour, in the winter
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of 1772 and 1773, for the conversion of the Shawanees, led him down to the Scioto, which he mentions as opposite the boundary of the u new province” (Walpole).
The Shawanees had abandoned their town at the mouth of the Scioto, and transferred them- selves to the plains on the line between the pres- ent counties of Ross and Pickaway. Their chief town was Chillicothe (Oldtown, or Frankfort), near the north fork of Paint Creek. Between this and the Scioto were Blue Jacket’s town, and Pickaweeke, the latter named from the Picks formerly settled there, who were perhaps Miamis, as at Pickalinny, or Piqua.
Jones went up the Scioto to Blue Jacket’s town on Deer Creek, and was introduced by the traders (several of whom he mentions as living at this and other towns on Deer Creek and the Scioto) to the Shawanees king. He spent the winter en- deavoring to persuade the Shawanees, who it will be remembered were now becoming more and more refractory and hostile, that he was no trader, but had come to speak to his Indian brothers of heavenly things. But Mr. Jones had not the slightest knowledge of Indian language or char- acter, and with the small pittance allowed by his society could not afford an interpreter. With no outfit but his theology, his mysterious silence and his singular dress excited a suspicion that he was a spy, and but for the friendly interference of the traders, his situation would have been very
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unsafe. Departing from the Shawanees for Fort Pitt, he rode across the country by way of the Standing Stone and Salt Lick Creek (the Lick- ing) to the Muskingum. Near the Licking he lodged a night at Ellet’s. 46 This Shawanee,” he noted, u is very rich in cattle, horses, and captive negroes.”
He described the colony at Shoenbrun as al- ready so well advanced, in February, 1773, that by frugality they had built neat log-houses to dwell in, and a good house for divine worship, with a floor and chimney and comfortable seats. Their meetings morning and evening, and their conduct in worship, he found praiseworthy. There was some indifference on Zeisberger’s part, he thought, when he offered to preach to the Indians. But he was gratified the next morning, though he does not say what success he had.
Mr. Jones’s visit led to an accession of some im- portance to the Moravians. At one of the Indian towns down the river, where they were holding a drunken feast and dance under favor of the traders, Mr. Jones unwisely intermeddled, and but for the protection of Killbuck, a Delaware captain, and grandson of the head chief Neta- watwes, would probably have lost his life. After the debauch was over, he had the courage to re- appear, and preached against the sin and ruin of whiskey, to such purpose that Killbuck destroyed the whole stock of the traders, and warned them that if they brought any more they should be
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scalped. Killbuck, not long afterwards, followed this up by taking sides openly for the missions.
It is easy to perceive from Mr. Jones’s mistakes how the Indians were drawn to the Moravians. Good-will once secured, their great aim was to convert the savage to their life of peace and love. To accomplish it, these wild sons of the forest were constantly urged to turn their thoughts away from blood and rapine to the love of Him who gave to the world all its humanity, and in whose bosom the red man and the white alike found rest. The daily hymns and worship which so much engaged the Indians, all the exhortations of the preachers, turned upon the one great point of impelling them to live and die like Him who died rather than resist the violence of his enemies. It sought a total reverse of their nature. But the passion and crucifixion, as wrought up in the in- tense and fervent pictures of the Moravian ex- horters, seldom failed to rivet the attention of even the fiercest warrior ; for it was that supreme heroism of the captive, in the last agony of tor- ture, which was his grandest aspiration, and he was ready to adore it. While the unregenerate brave looked with scorn upon the Christian for- giveness and humility which could turn the other cheek when struck, yet before this ideal many of them yielded, and in silent homage with the “praying Indians,” as they were called, forsook the war-path. Among these were a number of distinguished chiefs.
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But in an outline the features of this little commonwealth cannot all be given. Considering the absolute ‘favor which it enjoyed for years among the Ohio tribes, it can hardly be doubted that, if these missions on the Muskingum had been established either ten years sooner or ten years later, the Delawares, the Shawanees, the Wyandots, and not improbably the Miamis, would have adopted their belief.
As it happened, there was an ill-fated conjunc- tion both in the time and the place of their es- tablishment. At the beginning, as observed, there had not been entire harmony in the invitation to them by the Delaware chiefs. Even Netawatwes was not in favor of it, though his reception of them was generous. But the war party, of which Captain Pipe was leader, was opposed to them. He was of the Wolf clan, and distinguished in war, but more remarkable for his active and wily intrigues in the council. He was ambitious, but not the equal, either in prowess or ability, of his principal antagonist, Captain White-eyes, the head war-chief.
Things went smoothly for the Moravians, how- ever, until the outbreak of the Senecas and Shawanees in 1774, caused by the infamous mur- ders of Logan’s family and other Indians by the border ruffians on the Ohio. The Shawanees town at Watamaki was destroyed by Colonel McDonald at the beginning of the Dunmore war, and the strain upon the Delaware to join these tribes
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thus came very close, and Pipe was urgent. Glickhican, at the head of six Moravian Assist- ants, went up to the council at Tuscarawi to sup- port White-eyes and the peace party. White- eyes barely carried the day, Netawatwes inclining for war. But though the hostiles were defeated at Kanawha, and humiliated by Dunmore’s march to the Scioto, the evil disposition towards the Moravians, to whom White-eyes was secretly in- clining, was so manifest that he suddenly with- drew himself from Netawatwes and the council. His power and leadership were so important, and Netawatwes was so much alarmed at the prospect of another defection like that of Glickhican, that he not only acknowledged the injustice he had done to White-eyes, but wholly changed his atti- tude to the Moravians. Glickhican and the As- sistants, now insisted on behalf of the Delaware brethren that their teachers (the missionaries) be treated as members of the Delaware nation. Netawatwes at once proclaimed his change of sentiment to the council, and on White-eyes’ de- mand it was decreed, in the name of the whole Delaware nation, that from thenceforth they would receive the word of God ; that the Chris- tian Indians and their teachers should enjoy per- fect liberty, and the same rights in the Delaware country as other Indians, and all who wished to go to them and receive the gospel should be un- molested.
Upon this event old Netawatwes expressed
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great joy, and until the day of his death was con- stant to the Moravians. He and his people soon afterwards abandoned Tuscarawi and established a new capital at Goschocking (Coshocton). The chiefs, in consequence of this change, desired to have a mission village nearer to that place. Lichtenau was therefore established by their authority, three miles below Goschocking, on the Muskingum. In April, 1776, Zeisberger and Heckewelder installed a colony from Shoenbrun in possession. Fields, building lots, and gardens were laid out, with a long street through them north and south, and the chapel in the middle.
For still greater security to the colony, the Wyandots were consulted, the lands on the Mus- kingum having been ceded by them to the Dela- wares thirty years before. The two nations now united in confirming to the Christian Indians all the lands on the Muskingum from Tuscarawi (Ge- pelemukpechunk), down to the bend below New- comerstown, a distance of more than thirty miles. The population of the Moravian villages at the close of 1775 was four hundred and fourteen per- sons.
Events of much significance were the visits of distinguished Shawanees. One from the Hock- hocking joined the congregation. A chief from one of the Scioto towns, accompanied by his wife, a captain, and several counselors, spent some days at Gnadenhiitten. Much the most important, however, was Cornstalk, with a retinue of more
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than a hundred persons, who was entertained for a week with due distinction. “ I shall never forget your kindness,” he said in departing, “ and will acquaint all my friends that we have established this bond of friendship.” But he was murdered two years afterwards by some Kanawha militia.
The calamity of the Moravians was the war of the American Revolution. It developed the dan- gerous fact that their villages, Lichtenau espe- cially, were close upon the direct line between Pittsburgh and Detroit, the outposts of the two contending forces. Commissioners appointed by Congress had held a council of the Six Nations and western Indians, October, 1775, at Pittsburgh. The Moravians also were invited, but Zeisberger considerately declined. The western tribes other than the Delawares were manifestly unfriendly, and leaned to the side of the king. The division among the Delawares was known. The commis- sioners and the agent of Congress did not urge them to take sides, but rather to sit still and not take up the hatchet at all. This joyful report was taken back by their deputies, and it was there- fore announced that the Delawares stood neutral.
But there had been hot words in the council at Pittsburgh. White-eyes would not conceal his favor toward the American cause. A speaker of the Six Nations in a haughty way reminded him that the Delawares, in their eyes, had no voice or authority in the matter. White-eyes, long since tired of this treatment, replied with great disdain
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that he knew the Six Nations considered him and his people as conquered and as their inferiors, 44 but/’ he exclaimed, waving his hand in the direc- tion of the Alleghany River, 44 all the country on the other side of that river is mine ; ” this being the Indian orator’s phrase for impersonating his nation.
So bold and defiant a speech as this had not before been thrown at the Six Nations, and it was soon made the pretext for another division in the council of the Delawares ; for Pipe, together with the Monsys, took the ground that this would undoubtedly draw down the resentment of the Six Nations upon them. By this he succeeded in drawing off from the Moravians a Monsy chief named Newalike, followed by a number of the same clan, who were made to believe their chief knew of some imminent peril about to fall upon the Delawares, and wished to save them. These apostates filled Shoenbrun with discord, and Zeis- berger, fearing the disaffection would spread, pro- posed that the faithful part of the congregation at that place should abandon it. The greater portion withdrew in April to Lichtenau. The result was that Newalike and his adherents moved off to Sandusky. Pipe withdrew from the coun- cil ; and his town some fifteen miles up the Wahl- honding became the centre of the malcontents. The peace party under Netawatwes, supported by White-eyes, Killbuck, Big Cat, and other chiefs, not only sustained the missions, but constantly consulted the missionaries in their affairs.
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The worth of the Moravian missions, and their power over the Indians, is seen in the fact that for five years after the breaking out of the war they kept the Delawares in this position of neu- trality, in spite of the incessant provocations of the war party, as well as the Wyandots and Shawanees, to make them join the British inter- est. The death of Netawatwes in 1776, and of White-eyes in 1778, were severe blows, the latter particularly. White-eyes was aiding General Mc- Intosh in establishing Fort Laurens at this time. When reports were circulated in 1777 that the British governor at Detroit was dissatisfied with the Delawares, and attributed their refusal to unite in arms with his Indians to the influence of the missionaries, a deputation of the chiefs, accom- panied by two of the Moravian Indians, carried a message to the governor. His reply was, that “ they should consider the missionaries as an in- valuable treasure, on account of the good they had done among the Indians, and should by no means part with them.”
Another tribute to the missionaries soon after- wards was even more signal. A Wyandot em- bassy had been offering the war-belt again at Goschocking, and went home enraged with the answer, which was that “the Delawares had en- gaged to hold the chain of friendship with both hands, and therefore could spare no hand to take hold of a war-belt.” In August, two hundred Wyandots, headed by Pomoacan, their half-king,
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suddenly appeared at Goschocking. To gain time, Glickkican advised his people to give them a kind reception and feed them well. Under his management, the Wyandots to their great sur- prise were met, on their arrival, by a number of the Lichtenau people with loads of provisions, and entertained by one of Glickhican’s choicest speeches ; the conclusion of it being an earnest appeal to the half -king that he would “ consider their teachers as his own body and love them as cousins.”
Pomoacan declared that Glickhican’s words had penetrated his heart, and that he would immedi- ately consult his warriors. In a short time he announced their full acceptance of the proposal made to them. “ Go on,” he said, “ and obey your teachers, and be not afraid that any harm shall be done to them. Attend to your worship and never mind other affairs. You see us, indeed, going to war, but you may remain easy and need not think about it.” The next day the half-king, with his chief captain and eighty-two warriors, went down to Lichtenau, and after meeting and shaking hands at the schoolhouse with Zeisberger and Edwards, they were entertained at another boun- teous meal, spread under an arbor of green boughs. Every Indian was loaded with as much as he could carry to Lichtenau. Pomoacan sent back messengers to the Wyandot chiefs at San- dusky, and to the governor at Detroit, with an account of the covenant he had made, and an
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assurance that he and his warriors had acknowl- edged the white brethren to be their fathers. The Moravians were distrustful of Pomoacan, for they knew his intriguing ways, but he kept faith with them awhile by taking care that none of his war parties should disturb them.
In the next year a similar encounter was warded off, with a more singular result. The principal war chief of the Canada Wyandots (Hurons) had been sent by the commandant at Detroit, with ninety chosen warriors, to make a border raid on the Ohio. He halted near Lich- tenau, and sent in a message to Glickhican, his comrade in the late French war. The latter went out to meet his old friend, and brought him and his captains, at their own request, into town, to visit the missionaries. The speech-making be- came very impressive ; the more so as the Huron, after complimenting his Christian cousins and their teachers, observed that he as well as they had teachers and a house for prayers, and also the large book (Bible). 44 But,” said Glickhican, in replying to this part of the speech, 44 I doubt whether yours be the same book from which our teachers instruct us. In the book which they have, God commands in one place, 4 Thou shalt not kill ; ’ in another place, 4 Love your enemies ; 5 nay, it says, 4 Pray for them.’ Can it be supposed, then, that He that created man should not be offended when they destroy each other ? When we were accomplices, brother, each of us strove to
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outdo the other in murdering human beings ; but we knew no better. You and I were friends when we were young, and have remained such to this day, when we both are old. Let us do alike and put away from us what is bad, and forbidden by God, the killing of God's creatures.”
When Glickhican finished, the war chief retired to his camp. In an hour he returned with a sin- gle attendant only, and requested an interview with the National Assistants, of whom Glickhican was the head. “ I have considered your words,” he said, “and will now open my heart to you.” He stated his office, his orders, and his present duty to the governor. “ I will tell you how I will act. I will go within a day’s march of the Ohio. I will capture a prisoner, who shall be taken to my father (the governor), with the charge that he be not hurt. With that I will return him his hatchet, which he forced upon me. Not a life shall be lost by my party, and in ten days you shall see me here again, if the Great Spirit spares my life.”
Taking his farewell, in ten days he returned with a prisoner, as he had said, and stopping only for a meal passed on. He appointed a time with Glickhican when he would return to see him, but he would not approach that place again, he said, with arms in his hand.
The same year which deprived the Moravian missions of the powerful support of White-eyes had brought upon them a dire calamity in the
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arrival at Goschocking of McKee, Elliott, and Simon Girty, who had been under arrest at Pitts- burgh as spies and secret agents of the Tory cause. They had escaped, and were now entering upon that savage career which made their names infa- mous in Western history. McKee was the chief, and the band took Captain Pipe into their coun- cils. The Moravians, it may be inferred, became objects of their malignity. These men were ac- quainted with all the Indian tribes, and were soon spreading false reports among them, which were calculated to alarm even the friendly Delawares, as to the intentions and plans of the Americans. Their object was to arouse the Indian nations, and lead them to unite at once in driving the Ameri- cans across the Ohio River, if they would preserve themselves from being murdered or made slaves. White-eyes’ last triumph had been in suppress- ing one of these lies, which had nearly turned the whole Delaware nation against him on the ground that he was a friend of the Americans. Now that he was 44 put out of the way,” which was solemnly ascribed to the 44 will of the Great Spirit, that the nation might be saved,” these incendiaries soon contrived to have things their own way.
McKee, who had been deputy Indian agent at Pittsburgh before the war, now became agent and manager of this department under the governor at Detroit, and rumors were thick that the gov- ernor was determined to punish all Indians, Mora- vians not excepted, who would not turn out and
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fight the American rebels. The governor (Hamil- ton) was captured in February, 1779, by Colonel Clark, in his fort at Vincennes, but the excitement and hostility against the missions increased. Heckewelder intimates that much of the inhu- manity charged upon Hamilton, for which he was kept imprisoned in Virginia, was the work of McKee and his understrappers, and was unknown to the governor. Smarting under the severe measures which the commander at Pittsburgh had adopted in his treatment of them, the hostility of these men to the United States became un- bounded. They resorted to every possible device to excite a general war upon the frontier, and the missionaries were the special objects of their ha- tred, not only because they were holding back the Delaware nation, but because McKee suspected them of sending information to the American gov- ernment and officers of the doings in the Indian country. Through their instigation two attempts were made to assassinate Zeisberger, Girty him- self leading one of the parties for this purpose. Both were defeated by the vigilance of the mis- sion Indians.
These plots and Pipe’s increasing influence over the Delaware council created such a division at Goschocking, that Lichtenau was considered by the missionaries and assistants as no longer safe from the marauding parties continually passing that way. In March, 1780, it was abandoned, the chapel being pulled down that it might not
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be applied to heathenish purposes. The congre- gation set out, by land and water, to the new vil- lage of Salem, now built twenty miles up the river and within six miles of Gnadenhiitten. Here, with the same energy which they had dis- played in their previous colonizing, they built a new chapel of hewn timber, hung a bell, and con- secrated the edifice by the 22d of May, and the people were settled in their new houses before winter.
Very soon after this removal, Captain Pipe made Goschocking so uncomfortable that Kill- buck and his colleagues of the peace party were compelled to abdicate and seek safety for them- selves at Pittsburgh. Pipe, at the same time, fearing that he might be attacked by the Ameri- cans, went off with his adherents of the Wolf tribe to the Wyandots at Upper Sandusky. Thus the banks of the Muskingum, so quiet and happy for years under the gracious influence of the Moravians, were again given over to the fortunes of war. The three villages, nowin close proximity with each other, and removed from the great war- path twenty miles below them, moved on in their accustomed life of daily worship and labors, as though unconscious, in their faith and trust, that evil was near.
But the hideous truth now dawned upon them, that, secure as they felt themselves among the savages, their real enemies were the whites, and that the worst of these were those to whom they
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were most friendly — the Americans. It seems inexplicable, but the populace who now infested the Upper Ohio had taken it into their heads that the Moravian Indians were secretly their foes, and aiding if not perpetrating the murders and ravages on the frontier ; all this merely because they fed the passing war parties, as has been re- lated. Their towns were stigmatized as the “half- way houses” of the British on the road to Detroit. The least degree of intelligence or generosity should have comprehended the situation.
The first display of this frenzy was in August, 1780. Colonel Broadhead, the commander at Pittsburgh, marched over to the Muskingum with eight hundred troops, regular and militia, to sup- press the hostile rising at Goschocking. He halted two miles below Salem, and sent in a request for provisions, which were immediately supplied both there and at Gnadenhiitten. Hecke- welder went out to the camp, and was assured by Colonel Broadhead that no fault could be found with the missionaries by the Americans or by the British, acting, as they were, upon principles of humanity and zeal for the good of the people among whom they had been received. In the midst of this interview an officer entered to re- port that a part of the militia were breaking out for the purpose of destroying the Moravian vil- lages. The murderous design was checked with some difficulty ; Colonel Shepherd, of Wheeling, in command of another detachment of militia, be- ing particularly efficient in suppressing it.
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In strong contrast with the turbulence of these white savages was the behavior of the Delaware war chief Pachgantschihilas, who with eighty warriors soon afterwards went to Gnadenhiitten to arrest Killbuck. Having searched the town, and being assured that the chief had gone to Pittsburgh, he summoned the National Assistants of the three towns to meet him. He warned them of the dangerous position they occupied, as just shown by Colonel Broadhead’s expedition ; and while he did not reproach them for their love of peace rather than war, he urged them to go with him to a secure place (the Scioto or the Miami), where they might worship in peace, and have their farms and cattle and game just as abundantly as here. In conclusion he said : “ Think on what I have now told you, and be- lieve that if you stay where you now are, one day or other the Long Knives (Virginians) will in their usual way speak fair words to you, but at the same time murder you.” The words were prophetic, and but for the unfortunate disbelief of the assistants in the possibility of such an event, a temporary removal, under the protection which the war chief intended, might have saved the mission and their villages.
Notwithstanding disturbances in the outer world, this simple and confiding people enjoyed perfect peace and quiet until August in the following year, hardly seeing or hearing of the hostile In- dians. They not only had implicit faith in the
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forbearance of the surrounding tribes, and equal incredulity that the whites would injure them, but in their way had counseled with their divine Head and Master, and assured themselves that it was His will they should abide where they were.
Unknown to them, they were between two sets of white men equally bent upon their destruction : one consisted of McKee and his confederates, who were striving for the mastery of the Ohio Indians, in order to hurl them in a mass upon the weak frontier, which Congress had left unprotected ; the other, of the low, uncivilized frontiersmen, more cruel and bloody than the Indians, who hated the introduction of Christianity, or any other means of reclaiming the red man. The onset of the two happened almost as though it had been planned in concert.
How the British commander at Detroit, in 1781, was induced to reverse the just and generous fa- vor shown to the Moravians by his predecessor in 1777, is not yet explained. Ohio at this time was under the government of Quebec, and this, like other matters going on in Ohio from 1774 until 1795, cannot be cleared up until the reports and correspondence during that period between the governor at Detroit and his chief at Quebec are more fully published. It was the opinion of Zeisberger and Heckewelder, after the frequent conferences which they had with the governor at Detroit, that McKee was the prime cause of the trouble, and that he, by procuring false reports
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from Elliott, Pipe, Pomoacan, and various agents, persuaded the governor that the missionaries were partisans of the American cause, and engaged in a correspondence with its officers prejudicial to the British interest. It must be admitted that in some degree this was true, as since discovered from Zeisberger’s diary.
It was this that determined Major De Peyster, the commandant at Detroit (and governor by courtesy), to rid himself of neighbors so trouble- some and dangerous. The British agent of Indian affairs (Heckewelder says McKee) called upon the council of the Six Nations to remove them. They undertook the commission, in their usual wary manner, by sending a message to the Ottawas and Chippewas and calling on them to attend to it. They refused, declaring that the Christian Indians had done them no injury.
The message was then sent to the Wyandots. Pomoacan half consented ; pretending that he would do so only to save the Christian Delawares from destruction. McKee now appeared with Elliott, Pipe, and Girty, and, as a further induce- ment, offered him a reinforcement of Delawares, Shawanees, and Ottawas, enough to double his force, and promised him the command. On these conditions, and that Elliott and Pipe should go with him, Pomoacan consented. McKee now re- tired to his place on the Scioto (near Oldtown) to await the consummation of his plan.
The expedition was kept secret, so that none
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but the captains knew its destination ; and the Moravians were surprised when Pomoacan, with Pipe and a hundred and forty warriors, suddenly appeared at Salem on the 10th of August, 1781, accompanied by Elliott. His tent, with the Brit- ish flag hoisted above it, formed the centre of their camp. Glickhican went out to learn what this was for, and returned with Pomoacan and Elliott to the house of Hecke welder, the resident missionary. After the usual salutations, the Wyandot chief announced that a matter of im- portance required the attendance of the chief men of all the villages. A meeting at Gnadenhiitten was appointed for the next day, and Pomoacan and his followers at once proceeded to that place. In the course of the next four days three hundred warriors had assembled.
For three weeks a controversy was waged whether the missions should be removed; the Christian Indians expostulating against the cruelty and starvation to which they would be exposed, but offering to go if allowed until the spring to prepare for removal. Pomoacan and even Pipe and their warriors thought this reasonable and were satisfied, but Elliott was so much displeased that he made himself offensive. The warriors, in retaliation, began to shoot at the British flag, and Elliott had to haul it down. After ten days of wrangling, the Indians standing out for mercy to the Moravians, though some were for murdering them, Elliott carried his point by a threat that
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unless they complied with his demand he should leave them, and the governor would abandon them to the Americans as enemies.
This drove the Indians to extremities. Sud- denly, on the 3d of September, the missionaries were seized and robbed, their families turned out of doors, their houses pillaged, their books and papers burned or scattered to the winds. Al- though it had not been intended to disturb the Christian Indians, the excited warriors soon for- got all distinction. There was no bloodshed, but the three villages were a scene of general robbery and violence. The missionaries and their families were to be banished, but all their people, except such as had already fled, chose to follow7 them. Glickhican in some way gave offense, and sixteen Delawares were sent down to Salem to seize him. They surrounded his house, but hesitated about entering. Observing their timidity, he stepped out and thus accosted them: “Friends! I con- clude you are come for me. If so, obey your orders. I am ready to submit. You appear to dread Glickhican as formerly known to you. Yes, there was a time when I would have scorned to be assailed in the manner you now meditate ; but I am no more Glickhican.” With trembling hands they tied him and took him to Pomoacan, but upon explanation he was discharged.1
1 This gleam of the warrior was unusual for Glickhican. On the war-path his name had been terrible. But, in his degree, there is no finer example of the “fierceness of man refrained."
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On September 11th, the people of the three vil- lages assembled at Salem, with such horses, cattle, and effects as Elliott had left them. A last and most impressive service was held in the chapel, and the sacraments of baptism and the eucharist were administered. The whole caravan then moved off, some by water and some by land, up the Walhonding, to Gokhosing (Owlstown), at the confluence of Owl and Mohican creeks. From here to their destination (Upper Sandusky) all journeyed by land.
In November, Pipe was ordered by the governor to bring the missionaries before him at Detroit for investigation. The scene as described by Zeisberger and Heckewelder was highly interest- ing. The commandant, Major Arendt Schuyler De Peyster, of the 8th British Infantry, a native of New York, held a formal council, where, seated amid his officers and the Indians, the missionaries and assistants grouped on one side, Pipe and his friends on the other, he ordered in an emphatic manner that Pipe should now repeat, in the pres- ence of the Moravians, the charges which he had at various times brought against them. The chieftain was abashed, and turning to his accom- plices, bade them speak. They were equally at fault. Pipe thereupon, with the versatility in
This humble convert took the name of Isaac ; and in the mas- sacre, March 7, 1782, he yielded as a child, when the raising of his war-whoop to the forty-six men who perished with him might have scattered their murderers in dismay.
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which he excelled, began to extol the missionaries, and implored the governor “ to say good words for them, as they were friends of the Delawares, and he should be sorry if they were treated hard.”
The governor exposed his treachery by requir- ing Pipe to repeat the accusations which he had been sending him. He acknowledged his wrong, and being asked by the governor what was now to be done with the missionaries, he advised that they be sent back to their homes. They were sent back to Sandusky, clothed and supplied by Major De Peyster, but no amends was made for their wrongs. Thus far the English.
The intense sufferings of the poor people from exposure and starvation during the winter in- duced a hundred or more under Glickhican and five other assistants to return in February, 1782, to their villages to save the corn left standing in their fields. On the 7th of March they had just finished and were about to return, when a merci- less crew of ninety men from the Ohio, one of whom named David Williamson passed for colonel, came upon them, and having, under pretense of escorting them to Pittsburgh, secured their guns, hatchets, and even pocket-knives, shut them up in two houses, where they slaughtered all of them like sheep, men and women, ninety-six in number ! This colonel left it to a vote whether he should keep his word, or murder the deluded prisoners, and only eighteen of the ninety were honest
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enough to oppose this basest of massacres. Yet good Dr. Doddrige has apologized for Williamson as “ loaded with unmerited reproach, because he was only a militia officer, who could advise but not command.”
The Nemesis, in the following year, was the more shocking, inasmuch as this man escaped, and the victim who suffered for his atrocious crime was a man of worth. Another expedition, of larger numbers, set out from the Ohio River in May, 1782, to destroy what was left of the Moravian Indians at Sandusky, and also to lay 'waste the Wyandot towns. Colonel William Crawford, un- happily for him, and it is said against his will, was elected over Williamson by this rabble to be their commander, the latter being chosen as second. They marched to the Sandusky Plains, watched by the Indians at every camp, but Mora- vians and Wyandots alike had disappeared. In much confusion, arising from the insubordination of his men, Colonel Crawford wheeled about to return, and at once was assailed on every side by swarms of Indians lurking in the high grass. His force became divided, and a large party under Williamson made their escape. Colonel Crawford was captured, and fell into the hands of Pipe. This chief, by reason perhaps of De Peyster’s rebuke, but still more from rage at the wanton massacre of the Christian Delawares, for which it seems he died repentant, was inexorable to every appeal for mercy to Crawford, in which even
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Girty, according to one account, joined, much to his peril, and caused him, after horrible torture, to be burned at the stake.
So perished the Moravian missions on the Mus- kingum. Not that the pious founders ceased their labors, or that these consecrated scenes knew them no more. But their Indian communities, the germ of their work, the sign of what was to be accomplished by them in the great Indian problem, were scattered and gone. Zeisberger, at their head, labored with the remnants of their congregation for years in Canada. They then transferred themselves temporarily to settlements on the Sandusky, the Huron, and the Cuyahoga rivers. At last he and Heckewelder, with the survivors of these wanderings, went back to their lands on the Tuscarawas, now surrounded by the whites, but fully secured to them by the generos- ity of Congress.
It is understood, though Heckewelder in his modest narrative does not mention it, that in 1798 he visited Gnadenhiitten, and gathered up the relics of the ninety-six victims burned in the houses in which they were murdered. All were buried in the cellar of one of these houses, and a mound raised over the spot.
Goshen was established by Zeisberger near the old site of Shoenbrun, and here he had the happi- ness in 1803 to receive his bishop, Loskiel, the author of the best history in English of the Mora- vians. Here also, in 1808, full of years and of
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labors for his Master bravely and faithfully done, he died in the eighty-eighth year of his age. Heckewelder in 1801 reestablished the church at Gnadenhiitten also, and there made his residence until 1809; being postmaster, justice of the peace, and one of the associate judges of the Court of Common Pleas, as well as pastor.
The work thus struck down was wisely and well framed. If not successful, it was at any rate unexcelled as an attempt to bring the Indian and white races on this continent into just coordina- tion. So far has failure outweighed success in this harmonizing of the two races, that future ages, it is to be feared, will deem the failure a blot upon the civilization and intelligence of this period.
That these missions, though not enduring, as sometimes imputed, were none the less the pri- mordial establishment of Ohio, is as true as that Plymouth was the beginning of Massachusetts. Neither lasted long, but that was no fault of the Moravians. Plymouth, though equally obsolete, is proudly commemorated by the sons of Massa- chusetts. The Moravians may justly be remem- bered and honored as the pilgeims of ohio.
CHAPTER VII.
THE NORTHWESTERN TERRITORY.
Before the Declaration of Independence, the Continental Congress had called upon the colo- nies to establish governments each for itself. A Constitution was adopted by the Virginia conven- tion, in which a formal cession was made to Mary- land, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania of the territories which had been set apart to them by the king nearly a hundred and fifty years before, upon the forfeiture of the Virginia charter, and concluding with a manifesto which at once chal- lenged attention : —
“ The western and northern extent of Virginia shall in all other respects stand as fixed by the charter of 1609, and by the public treaty of peace between the courts of Britain and France in the year 1763, unless by act of this legislature one or more governments be established westward of the Allegheny Mountains ; and no purchase of lands shall be made of the Indian na- tions but on behalf of the public by authority of the General Assembly .”
This was a remarkable declaration, considering that Virginia was not referred to in the treaty of 1763, and its extent by the charter of 1609 was
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fixed only as “ that space or circuit of land lying from the seacoast of the precinct aforesaid up into the land throughout from sea to sea, west and northwest,” bounds which to this day have never been defined, or even intelligible, so that the extent of the domain was entirely unknown except so far as the province actually occupied and held the country.
Nor was it happily framed as a manifesto, if such was its purpose. The same prerogative by which it conceded Maryland, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania to have been detached, had, by the proclamation of 1763, restricted all the colonies, Virginia inclusive, within the limits of the Alle- ghany ridge. Cromwell’s recognition of the Vir- ginia charter in 1651 is sometimes cited in aid, but was futile. No act of the Commonwealth had any validity in English law. Even the years of its existence are counted as part of the reign of Charles II.
The treaty of Fort Stanwix, which by the very terms of the order in council was to settle the boundary line between the several provinces, as well as the Indian tribes, had extended the limit westward to the Tennessee River, but bounded it northward by the south bank of the Ohio River. This had been followed by an act of Parliament, supreme in English law, by which the region thus doubly reserved to the crown and divided from Virginia was annexed to the Province of Quebec, and at the time of this manifesto was
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under its government and control. This was rec- ognized by the act of Congress, March 26, 1804, directing that all legal grants in the Northwest by the French authorities prior to the Treaty of Paris in 1763, and by the British authorities prior to the treaty of peace in 1783, should be recorded in the land-offices. This was the status of the Northwest Territory when the war of the Revolution broke out ; and so it remained until 1783, except so far as it was affected by the cap- ture of the British posts at Kaskaskias and Vin- cennes.
But the position assumed by Virginia put a stop to the Articles* of Confederation. In the first draft it was proposed that Congress, among other powers, should limit the bounds of colonies which, by charter, proclamation, or other pre- tense, were said to extend to the South Sea, and assign territories for new colonies. When the bill emerged from the committee of the whole, this provision had disappeared. The articles were referred to the States, and in July, 1778, were found to have been ratified by all except New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland. As a unanimous assent was necessary, the confedera- tion was defeated.
The Maryland delegates then proposed to amend by restoring the provision as to western lands.- The proposition was defeated by the votes of the States of New Hampshire, Massachu- setts, Connecticut, Virginia, South Carolina, and
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Georgia, against those of Rhode Island, New Jer- sey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland ; the delegates of New York being equally divided, and those of North Carolina absent.
New Jersey and Delaware subsequently gave their concurrence. Maryland resolved, single- handed, to maintain her position, unless an article were added by which the country ceded by France to Great Britain should, if wrested from the latter by the common war, become the com- mon property of the Thirteen States. The Mary- land legislature issued a declaration of their mo- tive and principles, and instructed their delegates in Congress to abide by them.
The unseemly and inopportune strife was brought to a crisis by a Virginia statute, passed in the summer of 1779, opening a land office for the entry of lands west of the Alleghany Moun- tains. Although it prohibited land entries be- yond the Ohio, it operated as the signal for new inroads by the squatters and land jobbers. This brought remonstrances to Congress from persons styling themselves the Vandalia, the Indiana, and the Illinois and Wabash companies, setting up rights under the Walpole grant and the conces- sions at Fort Stanwix, which the king had re- jected. The delegates from Virginia demurred to the consideration of these claims, as pertaining exclusively to her sovereignty, and beyond the jurisdiction of Congress.
The other states now plucked up spirit, and
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the right to the western lands was agitated for three years. Congress insisted upon its jurisdic- tion, and declared that appropriations of the vacant lands by the several states during the war would be attended with mischief. Moreover, upon the receipt of a report from Colonel Broad- head, commandant at Pittsburgh, in November,
1779, that he was expelling trespassers from the west side of the Ohio and destroying their cabins, Congress ordered it to be transmitted to the gov- ernor of Virginia, with the request that any fur- ther in trusion be prevented. This drew a remon- strance from Virginia. Her position was that the United States could have no territory otherwise than in the right of one of the states ; the result of which, logically, would have been that no ces- sion could be obtained by treaty as the result of the war, and fatal, therefore, to her own claim.
The gloom cast upon the Revolutionary cause by this unsettled state of the Union, and an ad- verse turn of the war, was broken in February,
1780, by the patriotic example of New York, which it will be remembered had not voted upon the Maryland proposition. Her delegates were now authorized to surrender to the United States, for the common good, all her right and title, both of soil and jurisdiction, westward of such a line or boundary as these delegates should deem ex- pedient.
This was the title claimed through the Six Nations, or Iroquois, and asserted as extending
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to the Mississippi River. Upon the report of a committee to which this offer, together with the Maryland declaration and the Virginia remon- strance, was referred, Congress resolved to abstain from any discussion of the various titles and claims now brought into opposition, but to urge upon the other states to follow the example of New York and make liberal concessions, instead of persisting in attempts which endangered the stability of a general union. Congress at the same time made emphatic the assurance, ever since regarded as the basis of the public land sys- tem, that all territory surrendered by the states should be disposed of as a common fund, and formed into new states upon equal footing in the Federal Union with, the original states ; also that the expense incurred by any state in subduing British posts, or acquiring and defending terri- tory so surrendered, should be reimbursed by the United States.
Propositions soon followed from Connecticut and Virginia, but upon such conditions as could not be entertained. One which Virginia required was singularly inconsistent with her high preten- sions. It was that, in consideration of yielding her western claims, the United States should guarantee her territory on “ the southeast side of the Ohio River.” Another was, that all royal grants, and all purchases from the Indians, in the ceded territory, inconsistent with the chartered rights of Virginia, should be held void. The
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absurdity of the claim of Connecticut, under her charter from Charles II. in 1662, was twice adjudicated; — in the first instance, by a royal commission, in 1664, between that colony and the Duke of York; and again in December, 1782, by a commission of Congress between Connecti- cut and Pennsylvania. Her people, in the midst of the war, were intruding upon the Wyoming valley under pretense of this charter.
Maryland gracefully yielded to the appeal of Congress by signing the Articles of Confedera- tion, March 1, 1781. On the same day, probably by concert, the delegates of New York executed a cession by that state of all her rights and ter- ritory west of the line which now forms her western boundary. This deed, together with the cessions offered by Virginia and Connecticut, and the petitions of the land companies, were referred by Congress to a committee.
The report of this committee, November 3, 1781, just after the surrender of Cornwallis, was somewhat startling. They were unanimous that the cession by New York should be accepted in behalf of the United States, because thereby the jurisdiction of the whole western country belong- ing to the Six Nations and their tributaries, and appendant to the government of New York, would be vested in the United States, greatly to the advantage of the Union. They also reported that for the same reason, and others which were fully set forth, Congress could not, consistently
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with the interests of the United States, or the right vested in them as the sovereign power, accept the cession of Virginia. They rejected the Connecticut cession, and the claims of the Vandalia (Walpole) and the Illinois and Wabash companies, but favored the allowance of the Fort Stanwix grant to Croghan which was presented by the Indiana company.
The issue thus suddenly precipitated upon Vir- ginia was unexpected, and as New York in her cession had reserved the right of having her title adjudicated by a commission like that which set- tled the dispute between Connecticut and Penn- sylvania, there was the prospect for awhile of an ominous contest. Mr. Madison was the leading member of the Virginia delegation in Congress, and anxiously regarded the action of this commit- tee as indicative of deep machinations, and per- haps a secret hostility to the Virginia cession in Congress. He wrote to the governor (Jefferson), and other Virginians best informed, entreating them to trace the title, and furnish him with every argument and document that could vindi- cate it. The adversaries, he warned them, would be either the United States or New York, or both. The correspondence by no means evinces a pro- found knowledge or faith as to the grounds on which the Virginia title had been so much pressed.
But this report never came to a vote. Con- gress, after the first impulse subsided, adhered in
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good faith to its first resolution not to discuss or touch the rival claims of the different states, and, resting upon its own reserved rights, sought to bury all contentions by covering the Western terri- tory with the titles of as many of the claimants as possible, be they what they might. This enabled Mr. Madison, when the question was brought up in May, 1782, to obtain a postponement until the Virginia assembly should meet and consider the situation. He was materially aided by the influ- ence of New York; General Hamilton, the lead- ing delegate of that state, entertaining the opinion that the title was inherent in the United States, and therefore neutral as between Virginia and New York.
In September Congress was anxiously casting about for means to replenish the treasury. Upon a suggestion of Dr. Witherspoon that the western lands would accomplish it, the subject was again approached in a side way, and another committee appointed. A separate vote accepting the New York cession was also obtained in October. The Virginia cession of January, 1781, was referred to the committee thus ostensibly appointed for rev- enue purpose. Mr. Madison was a member of it. To his patient and temperate counsels and me- diation, probably, it was due that the thorny terms and conditions demanded by Virginia were toned down to a compromise which was proposed by Congress September 13, 1783, and accepted by Virginia in December in the terms stipulated by
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Congress, “ although,” it was added, “ they do not come fully up to the propositions of this Common- wealth.” On the 1st of March, 1784, the deed of cession was executed.
The stipulations were those originally offered and assured by Congress, that the territory should be for the common benefit, and formed into states not less than one hundred nor more than one hun- dred and fifty miles square, to be admitted into the Union upon an equality with the original states ; that Virginia should be reimbursed for the expense of subduing the British posts, besides granting a donation of one hundred and fifty thou- sand acres at the falls of the Ohio to Colonel George Rogers Clark and his officers and soldiers ; and furthermore, that, in case there should not be a sufficient quantity of good lands south of the Ohio River to provide for the bounties due to the Continental troops of the Virginia line, the defi- ciency should be made up by good lands to be laid off between the Scioto and Little Miami rivers. The conditions that Virginia should be guaranteed in her territory southeast of the Ohio, and that all royal grants or Indian sales to private persons should be deemed void as inconsistent with the chartered rights of Virginia, were disallowed, inas- much as they would involve a discussion of the right of Virginia to the territory, which Congress intended studiously to avoid. The inference that Congress admitted any title of Virginia or the other colonies, by urging and accepting these ces-
THE NORTHWESTERN TERRITORY. 171
sions, is therefore a misapprehension. The ques- tion, by common consent, was to be buried. Had it come to an issue, Congress or a commission would probably have decided that the United States succeeded of right to the crown domain. Such was the opinion of leading men, and it was exactly expressed in the instructions to Mr. Jay, in 1782, not to relinquish the Mississippi. “It is sufficient that by the treaty of 1763 all the terri- tory now claimed by the United States was ex- pressly and irrevocably ceded to the king of Great Britain, and that the United States are, in conse- quence of the revolution in their government, en- titled to the benefit of that cession.” Mr. Madi- son was chairman of this committee.
Massachusetts surrendered her claims in April, 1785, and Connecticut, in September, 1786, yielded all claim south of the 41st degree of latitude, and west of a line one hundred and twenty miles from the west line of Pennsylvania. The two districts thus conceded by the United States to the Vir- ginia soldiers and to Connecticut fell within the bounds subsequently allotted to Ohio, and are known as the Virginia Military District and the Western Reserve. They were settled chiefly by people of those two states respectively. The dis- tricts purchased by the Ohio Company and by Symmes were peopled, the one from Massachusetts, the other from New Jersey. Thus it happened that in different quarters of Ohio a marked dis- tinction in manners and customs, and to some de-
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gree in the ideas, of the people grew up with the State, which at this day has not been effaced.
As to all lands north of the Ohio River, the title of the United States by the treaty of 1783 was therefore made conclusive. There is still an open question, between the states on its opposite banks, as to their respective jurisdiction over its waters. Thus far it has been determined only that Virginia and Kentucky do not extend further than low-water mark on the northern shore. Whether they extend to that line is as yet unsettled.
But Virginia, by her reduction of the British posts at Kaskaskias and Vincennes, had a special and meritorious ground for the concessions made to her by Congress. The fallacy has been in as- suming that this gave her any title to the country. In its very nature as a conquest made in a war in which Great Britain and the United States were the belligerents, and in which Colonel Clark’s invasion was justifiable only on the ground that Virginia and her troops were waging war in behalf of the United States, there can be no escape from the consequence that the success inured to the principal power and not to a mere segment. An- other fallacy is in assuming that the conquest extended farther east than the Wabash. The territory of Ohio was never a dependency of Vincennes, but always under the command of De- troit. It remained, as a matter of fact, under hostile occupancy of the British and Indians long after the treaty of 1783. No one understood this
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so well as Colonel Clark himself, who, after his victory on the Wabash, at once made strenuous efforts to raise an expedition against Detroit. The effort failed through General Washington’s inability to spare either troops or supplies for the campaign. How dangerous was this British occu- pancy of Detroit became fearfully apparent in the successive defeats of La Balm, Lochrey, McIntosh, and Crawford, during the Revolutionary War, and of Harmar and St. Clair subsequently. These events very clearly show that Virginia made no conquest east of the Wabash.
There is a theory that in the treaty of 1788 the United States acquired the boundary of the Mis- sissippi and the upper lakes by virtue of Clarke’s conquest and the rule of uti possidetis , as it is called in international law ; that is to say, each party retaining what it has in possession. But this does not appear by any account of the ne- gotiations. It does appear, on the contrary, from the instructions of Congress to their commis- sioners in Europe, that as early as December, 1776, the free navigation of the Mississippi River was claimed ; and that one among the points adopted in March, 1779, as essential to the safety and independence of the United States, was that in any treaty of peace, the same boundary must be insisted upon as that ceded to Great Britain by France. The difficulty as to the western lands was more with Spain and France than with Eng- land. The fisheries interested England more than the West.
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Obviously, the boundary established was not upon the principle of uti possidetis. The applica- tion of that rule would have left Ohio, Michigan, the larger part of Indiana and Illinois, and all of Wisconsin and eastern Minnesota, under British dominion.
Without waiting for the cessions by Massachu- setts and Connecticut, Congress passed an ordi- nance, May 20, 1785, for surveying and disposing of the public lands west of the Ohio River. The first geographer, or surveyor-general, was Thomas Hutchins, who as captain in the 60th British Infantry had served many years in the West as an officer of engineers, in which capacity he had shown high scientific qualifications. The system of rectangular surveys by sections, townships, and ranges was adopted by that ordinance, and by its requirement the initial point was established by Hutchins and Rittenhouse, the official geographer of Pennsylvania, at the point where the north bank of the Ohio River is intersected by the west line of Pennsylvania. This line is a meridian at the west extremity of the celebrated line of Mason and Dixon. On a base line extending due west from this point, the “ Seven Ranges ” were laid off which were the beginning of the land system of Ohio.
To open the way for surveys and sales of the western lands and induce emigration, it was es- sential to obtain the Indian title. A board of commissioners had been established for this pur-
THE NORTHWESTERN TERRITORY. 175
pose in 1784. Instead of seeking peace and friendship through the great Council of the Northwestern Confederacy, which had now trans- ferred its annual meetings from the Scioto to the Rapids of the Maumee (near Toledo), these offi- cials adopted a policy of dealing with the tribes separately. Year after year they treated with sundry gatherings of unauthorized and irrespon- sible savages, at what are known as the treaties of Fort Stanwix in October, 1784, Fort McIntosh (mouth of Big Beaver) in January, 1785, Fort Finney (near the mouth of the Big Miami) in January, 1786, and Fort Harmar (mouth of Mus- kingum) in January, 1789. By, these proceed- ings it was given out and popularly supposed that the Indian tribes on the Ohio had acknowledged the sovereignty of the United States, and surren- dered all the territory south and east of a line which passed up the Cuyahoga River and across the portage to the Tuscarawas, then descending this stream to Fort Laurens (near the line be- tween the counties of Stark and Tuscarawas), thence running west to the portage between the heads of the Big Miami and the Auglaize rivers, and down the Auglaize and Maumee rivers to Lake Erie. Congress was under the delusion that it had acquired the Indian title and full dominion of all the lands between this line and the Ohio River.
The mischief of these travesties was soon dis- covered in new raids and murders perpetrated upon the settlers of the government lands by the
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very tribes ignorantly reported and supposed to have ceded the territory. The error was so clearly pointed out, in a memorable speech or re- monstrance which was sent to Congress by the Council of the Confederates in December, 1786, that a passage from it is worth quoting. After deploring their disappointment that they had not been included in the peace made with Great Britain, they advised Congress that —
“ In their opinion the first step should be that all treaties on their part, carried on with the United States, should be with the general voice of the whole confed- eracy, and in the most open manner, without any re- straint on either side ; and as land matters are often the subject of our councils with you, and a matter of the greatest importance and of general concern to us, in this case we hold it indispensably necessary that any cession of our lands should be made in the most public manner, and by the united voice of the confederacy ; holding all partial treaties as void and of no effect.
“ We think the mischief and confusion which has followed is owing to you, having managed everything respecting us in your own way. You kindled your council fires where you thought proper, without con- sulting us, at which you held separate treaties, and have entirely neglected our plan of having a general confer- ence with the different nations of the confederacy. Had this happened, we have reason to believe every- thing would have been settled between us in a most friendly manner. We wish, therefore, you would take it into serious consideration and let us speak to you in the manner we proposed. Let us have a treaty with
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you early in the spring. We say let us meet half way, and let us pursue such steps as become upright and honest men. We beg that you will prevent your sur- veyors and other people from coming on our side of the Ohio River.
“It shall not be our fault if the plan we have sug- gested should not be carried into execution. In that case the event will be very precarious, and if fresh rup- tures arise we shall most assuredly, with our united force, be obliged to defend the rights and privileges which have been transmitted to us by our ancestors.
“ These are our thoughts and firm resolve, and we earnestly desire that you will transmit to us, as soon as possible, your answer, be it what it may.”
To this wise counsel Congress made an evasive answer. Afterwards it was resolved that a gen- eral treaty convention be held, and St. Clair, as governor of the territory, was instructed to take measures for holding it. But this was counter- manded the next week, and the consequences are well known. What influence brought about this reversal of the order for a general treaty may be surmised from the letter of St. Clair to the President, in May, 1789, transmitting his treaty at Fort Harmar : —
44 The reason,” he said, 44 why the treaty was made separately was a jealousy between them, which I was not willing to lessen by appearing to consider them as one people. I am persuaded their general confederacy is entirely broken.”
How grossly he erred in judgment is told in
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the disasters which followed in the campaigns of General Harmar and himself. The confederates were never so powerful as in the summer of 1793, when they refused to treat with General Washington’s commissioners as to any boundary but the Ohio, and sent them home.
Upon this dangerous footing Congress pro- ceeded to establish a “ temporary government ” of the Western territories. A declaratory reso- lution had been introduced in October, 1783, but the first definite action was by the adoption of Mr. Jefferson’s plan, April 23, 1784. His pro- ject was to divide all the western country north and south of the Ohio into new states by lines of latitude two degrees apart, intersected by two meridians of longitude to be drawn through the mouth of the Kanawha and the falls of the Ohio. These divisions were to compose seventeen states, ten of which north of the Ohio were to have borne the high-sounding names of Sylvania, Mich- igania, Chersonesus, Assenisipia, Metropotamia, Illinoia, Saratoga, Washington, Polypotamia, and Pelisipia. North Ohio would have fallen into Metropotamia. The remainder of the State would have been divided between Washington and Pelisipia ; Pelisipy being another name dis- covered for the Ohio River. But this portion of the bill was dropped by the committee, after it had been recommitted to them by Congress.
Another point introduced in the bill, but stricken out, notwithstanding the support of six
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states, by the rule which required a majority of seven, was Mr. Jefferson’s famous anti-slavery proposition : —
“ That after the year 1800 of the Christian era there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in any of the said States, otherwise than in punishment of crime whereof the party shall have been convicted to have been personally guilty.”
It is safe to say that, if the prohibition of slav- ery in the Northwest Territory had been left to depend upon this provision, all the States would have been slave states.
A supplement to the Ordinance of 1784 was offered by Mr. King of Massachusetts, in March, 1785, in this form : —
“ That there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in any of the States described in the resolve of Congress of April 23, 1784, otherwise than in pun- ishment of crime whereof the party shall have been personally guilty, and that this regulation shall be an article of compact, and remain a fundamental princi- ple of the Constitutions between the thirteen original States aud each of the States described in said resolve of April 23, 1784.”
To show, at a single view, the contrast between these and the proposition finally adopted, the con- cluding article in the Ordinance of 1787 is here given : —
“ There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary ser- vitude in the said territory otherwise than in punish-
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ment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted. Provided, always, that any person escaping into the same from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed in any one of the original States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service as aforesaid.”
Mr. Jefferson’s project left the door wide open. Nothing but the immediate and absolute prohibi- tion put upon the further introduction of slavery at the Northwest (for the French had already brought it there) saved it from the persistent im- portunities to repeal or suspend this article in the Ordinance of 1787. The first proposition made at the first session of the territorial legislature (1798) was that the assembly give its consent to the repeal. But it was unanimously resolved to stand by the Ordinance. It is to the honor of that eccentric son of Virginia, John Randolph, that the adverse report made by him in Congress, upon one of the last of these assaults, defended the pro- hibition most ably ; pointing to Ohio, then just admitted into the Union, as a striking proof of its wisdom.
The ordinance for the “ government of the territory northwest of the Ohio,” known as the Ordinance of 1787, was passed on the 13th of July, but there are indications in the proceedings of Congress that it had been in contemplation some time before September 29, 1786, when it first appears in the journal.
So much has been written and spoken of this
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great statute, that any comment upon it incurs the risk of being very trite. It has become merely historical ; most of its provisions having been superseded, as law, by the constitutions of the States formed under it, and admitted into the Union upon an equal footing with the original States. How little it commands the attention of our later statesmen appears in the admission of Minnesota, a sixth state within its confines, whereas the Ordinance was absolute that there should “ not be more than five.”
Famous for its great offspring of free states, it offers another view in which it may be regarded by Americans forever with pride. It showed how free colonies might be established and maintained by a parent state. It was the first demonstration to the disbelieving world, a hundred years ago, of the mode in which the young republic, just sprung from hard, colonial pupilage, and spurn- ing king and parliament, would deal with its own dependencies. What airs, it was fancied, would not Congress assume towards its colonies ! Would it not have to assert, like the imperial parliament, that they, planted by its hands, must be subjects of their supremacy as lawgiver ? Would these Americans, or could they suffer their territories to lay their own taxes and form their own laws, and have representation in Congress besides ? It was a crucial test, but it was consis- tently and completely met. The Ordinance was a masterpiece of statesmanship in reconciling
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and vindicating every principle for which the Thirteen Colonies appealed to arms, and it re- mains to-day the model in nearly all respects upon which the territorial governments of the United States are constructed.
One radical difference between the territories and the parent stock entitled the experiment to much allowance. England had not planted the American colonies, and had no proprietorship or right in the land which they took. They were the work of men who had individually or by companies been left by the English govern- ment to find territory and make a country for themselves. It was the tyranny which essayed to wrest their autonomy from them, after they had worked it out unaided, that stirred up the American Revolution. The Ordinance of 1787, on the contrary, like all the territorial govern- ments which have been modelled upon it, was established in a domain of the parent State.
The framing of the Ordinance, though supposed of late to have been a work of two or three days, bears internal evidence of long and mature delib- eration in every part. There are but six sections, divided about equally between a code of tempo- rary administration, a method for converting the territory into new states, and a compact between these and the original states, forever to remain unalterable “ unless by common consent.” Under these latter words the compact is deemed to have been dissolved by the equality conferred upon the new states when admitted.
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The administration of this temporary govern- ment over a few French villages, and 400,000 square miles of Indian territory, extending from Pennsylvania to the Mississippi, and from the Ohio to the great chain of lakes, terminating at the far away Lake of the Woods, was committed to a governor and three judges with a secretary. A few organic rules providing for land tenures, taxation, inheritances, and the disposal of property by deeds, wills, etc., were prescribed, but all other legislation was left to the governor and judges, who were empowered jointly to “ adopt and pub- lish such laws of the original States, criminal or civil, as they or the majority of them should deem suitable and necessary,” subject, however, to the disapproval of Congress. As soon as the governor should ascertain that there were “ five thousand free male inhabitants of full age in the district,” they were to elect a house of representatives, consisting of one for each five hundred inhabi- tants. This body, and a legislative council of five members, to be appointed by Congress out of ten residents of the district nominated by the House, composed, together with the governor, the general assembly of the territory, with authority to make all laws not repugnant to the articles of the Ordi- nance. But a superadded clause, the source of unseen harm still inhering in the institutions of Ohio, declared that no bill or legislative act what- ever was to' be of any force without the governor’s assent. It was not merely the qualified dissent,
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now known as the veto, but it enabled the gov- ernor to assert himself as a third branch of the assembly. He was also empowered, until the es- tablishment of the general assembly, to appoint magistrates and all county and township officers. Another of his powers, which became a source of contention, was to “ lay out counties and town- ships, subject to such alterations as the legislature thereafter might make.”
The article of the Ordinance in respect to new states stipulated that there should be not less than three nor more than five. The eastern state was to be bounded on the west by a line drawn due north from the mouth of the Big Miami River to the north boundary of the United States, and would have intersected the Strait of Macki- nac. But this was subject to alteration if more than three states should be established, so that Congress might form the additional state or states north of an east and west line drawn through the south bend or extreme of Lake Michigan. It will at once be seen that this was not prescribed as the south line of the new states, but as a limit. Nevertheless, upon this minute point an almost internecine contest was raised, fifty years after- ward, between Ohio and a territorial governor of Michigan, known as the “ Wolverine War.”
Two articles of the Ordinance were in the na- ture of a bill of rights, without which our fore- fathers regarded no country as safe, and its omis- sion in the Constitution of the United States was
THE NORTHWESTERN TERRITORY. 185
made a serious objection. One of the points was a prohibition of laws in any manner affecting pri- vate contracts made in good faith ; a landmark which a month later was borrowed and incorpo- rated into the federal Constitution. It has proved to be of incalculable security against wild legis- lation.
In the two concluding articles it was ordained, “ There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in said territory, otherwise than in pun- ishment of crime ; ” and that 44 religion, morality, and knowledge, being essential to good govern- ment and the happiness of mankind, shall forever be encouraged.” These were placed by the Ordi- nance as among “the fundamental principles of civil and religious liberty which form the basis whereon these republics, their laws and constitu- tions, are erected.”
The men who settled Ohio believed this, and proved it by the care with which the principles summed up and consecrated in the Ordinance were preserved and handed down in the Consti- tutions both of 1802 and 1851 ; especially in the articles prohibiting slavery and favoring the en- couragement of religion, morality, and knowledge as the means of government.
The former is that upon which the people of 44 these republics ” have been the most intent during the century since the Ordinance and the Constitution were framed, and which by a convul- sive effort has been laid at rest.
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The other principle has not been sustained ; indeed, it may be said to have lost much of its force, under powerful foreign influences which have asserted themselves in American politics and laws. But that this declaration was, at the time, the fixed and general sentiment of the American people and statesmen, is undeniable. General Washington and Dr. Franklin have left no uncer- tainty as to this, and there were no better expo- nents. The colonies, in fact, were founded upon it and for its sake. It became ingrained in the very fibre of those indigenous governments and institutions which were a century and a half si- lently growing up to form the American republic. It was the fervent intermingling of the spirit of liberty with this reverence for religion and moral- ity, as being the “ basis of good government and the happiness of mankind,” that first struck the attention of European patriots, and of which De Tocqueville was so keenly observant in his view of American democracy.
Whether it is not time that American states- men were heeding it, let wise men consider. It is not safe to forsake the customs and principles by which a people have risen to greatness. Nor did a people ever fail of enduring prosperity and happiness by the ways pointed out in the Ordi- nance of 1787. Democracy, or democratic insti- tutions, cannot rise above their fountain. In their nature they cannot be enduring without a public opinion powerfully rooted and reinforced in reli-
THE NORTHWESTERN TERRITORY . 187
gion and morality. This was American democ- racy prior to Mr. Jefferson and the French Revo- lution.
The authorship of this Ordinance has lately been made a subject of curious speculation. It is certain that some eminent men were differing upon it a year before its passage. But that Nathan Dane had the chief hand in forming it as it ultimately appeared, was never doubted during his life or that of his contemporaries. Mr. W ebster as- serted it with emphasis in both of his speeches in the great debate in January, 1830, concerning the public lands. Chief Justice Chase reiterated it in 1833 in the historical sketch prefixed to his compilation of the statutes of Ohio. Recent dis- coveries, however, are supposed to displace him, and Dr. Cutler is brought forward as having given the paper its stamp and character. The subject seems to have fallen under that morbid infirmity in literature which delights in denying Homer and Shakespeare their works, and sometimes has not spared even Holy Writ from its rage.
In the present instance there has been a re- markable industry, not only in turning certain ex- pressions in Dr. Cutler’s diary to a sense which he cannot have intended, but in avoiding the source where information should naturally have been sought. Mr. Dane’s “ Abridgment of American Law ” contains a precise statement as to the com- position of the Ordinance; pointing out his own part, and giving credit to the authors of the parts
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which he did not contribute.1 He is confirmed in his statements by the fact, which appears in the journals of Congress, that he was a member of the committee which reported the Ordinance, through all its steps, from first to last.
1 See Appendix, No. 2.
♦
CHAPTER YIII.
THE EARLY SETTLERS.
The first settlers of Ohio, whoever they were, would furnish a theme for a poet ; not that they reflect such beautiful lights and shadows as Long- fellow has pictured in those of the Acadian coast and the prairies of fair Opelousas, but vanishing and lost in the same dim obscurity. They were ; that is all. No historical trace of them remains. The French who came floating up the shores of Lake Erie must have found homes, early in the eighteenth century, among their old allies, the Hurons (Wyandots), at Sandusky, or Junundat, as they called the bay, and on the wide-spread- ing, flowery plains through which the river flowed to it. Yet the earliest account of Ohio, an anony- mous memoir or report in 1718 concerning the Indians of Canada as far as the Mississippi, though it gives a graphic touch of geography, makes no mention of French inhabitants. Here is an extract : —
“ A hundred leagues from Niagara, on the south side (Lake Erie), is a river called Sandosquet, which the In- dians of Detroit and Lake Huron take when going to war with the Flatheads and other nations toward Caro-
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lina, such as the Cheraquis, the Indians residing on the river Casquinampo (the Tennessee), and the Chaoua- nons (Shawanees). They ascend this river Sandosquet two or three days, after which they make a small portage of about a quarter of a league. Some make canoes of elm bark, and float down a small river (Scioto) that empties into the Ohio, which means Beautiful River ; and it is indeed beautiful. Whoever would wish to reach the Mississippi easily, would need only to take this beautiful river or the Sandosquet ; he could travel without any danger of fasting, for all who have been there have repeatedly assured me that there is so vast a quantity of buffalo and of all other animals in the woods along that beautiful river, they were often obliged to discharge their guns to clear a passage for themselves. They say that two thousand men could very easily live there. To reach Detroit from this river Sandosquet, we cross Lake Erie from island to island, and get to a place called Point Pelee, where every sort of fish are in great abundance, especially sturgeon, very large, and three, four, and five feet in length. There is on one of these islands so great a number of cats (raccoons) that the Indians killed as many as nine hundred in a very short time. The ob- ject of the Indians in making this traverse is to shorten their road considerably, and were they not to do so they must go as far as the river which flows from the Miamis,1 and which is at the head of the lake.”
There are possibilities also of white settlements at Demoiselle’s fort and the Scioto Plains. A circumstance hinting at this is mentioned both by Captain Gist and the Rev. David Jones.
1 9 N. Y. Historical Docs ., 885-892.
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191
Many of the resident traders married white women who had been taken captive when chil- dren by the Indians, and had grown up among them. It seems doubtful whether General Bou- quet recovered a fourth part of the whites who were then in Ohio. How little we know of the actual state of affairs is revealed in the casual allusion by Mr, Jones to the Shawanees farmer on the Licking, with his horses, cattle, and negro slaves.
But coming to matters of fact, there were primitive settlements on the north side of the Ohio, as far down as the Muskingum, years be- fore the government surveys and sales of lands, and upon no title but what was known as the “ tomahawk right.” Deadening a patch of woods near the head of a spring, cutting the initials of the claimant’s name into the corner trees, and throwing up any sort of a hut, constituted an “ improvement.” Division lines were chiefly on the water-courses, or the top of the ridges. The earliest farms, therefore, resembled an amphi- theatre. The cabin was always on the lower ground, which pleased the squatter because of its convenience ; “ everything came to the house
dowm hill.” When this hilly part of Ohio in the “ Seven Ranges ” was laid off by the survey- ors’ arbitrary square lines, without regard to hill or dale, there was not only a subversion of the tomahawk titles, but a total change in the aspect of the farms. The houses then, as frequently,
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occupied the top of the hill. But many old set- tlers clung to the belief that there was more ague on the hills than in the bottoms.
This contraband population, chiefly from western Pennsylvania and Virginia, introduced by the traders and land speculators, and foment- ers of all the wrongs of the Indians, must have commenced before the Revolutionary War. The Rev. Mr. Jones states that in descending the Ohio River with George Rogers Clarke and others in 1772, they saw but one habitation between Pitts- burgh and Captina. This was the year that the Moravians built Shoenbrun and Gnadenhiitten. But Colonel Robert Patterson found several im- provements below the Hockhocking in 1776 ; and in October, 1778, Colonel Broadhead reported to General Washington that he had sent troops from Pittsburgh to drive off a land company who were trespassing upon the Indians somewhere opposite to Wheeling. The officer detached upon this duty reported that he had found settle- ments from Fort McIntosh down to the Muskin- gum, and extending thirty miles up the streams on the west side of the Ohio. He had evidently not executed his orders, as these people were still the chief subjects of complaint of the Indians at the treaty of Fort McIntosh in 1785. Nor was their enterprise exclusively confined to stealing land. Some of them appropriated the salt springs (Mahoning County) which had long been used by the Indians ; and before their expulsion
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by the military, had erected cabins, sunk vats, and made some progress in manufacturing salt, then worth six dollars per bushel. Judge Par- sons subsequently purchased this township from the Connecticut Associates, and lost his life in endeavoring to develop the salt business.
Upon the receipt of Colonel Broadhead’s re- port, Colonel Harmar, the military commandant on the Ohio, at once dispatched Ensign Arm- strong with a force to expel the squatters. He reported that there were at least a dozen settle- ments on the west side of the Ohio, and gave the names of several of considerable population. He was informed of one at the falls of the Hock- hocking, where there were three hundred families, but this was evidently an exaggeration. The chief men of these upper settlements were Ross and Norris ; the former established at Mingo Bottom, and the latter farther down at Mercer- town. At this place two justices of the peace had been elected and were exercising jurisdiction. A paper signed by more than sixty of the set- tlers was presented to Armstrong, begging indul- gence until the winter was over. At Norristown, in the same vicinity, an armed assemblage pro- posed to resist, but they were intimidated by his show of hostility, and dispersed under a compro- mise by which all were given until the 19th of April to remove to the other side of the Ohio. Ross and a few others who were refractory were captured and imprisoned.
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This attempt, however, was as inefficacious as the first. General Butler, in descending the Ohio in October to meet the Indians at Fort Finney, found Ross still in possession and purpos- ing to go to Congress, as he announced, to vindi- cate himself and his neighbors from aspersion. At the mouth of the Kanawha General Butler found a town laid out upon Cornstalk’s battle- field, and town lots fronting the river already sold at ten pounds each. On the back streets they were selling at five pounds each.
The history of these squatters is hardly worth pursuing. The blood of the Moravians is the u damned spot ” upon their memory. The man- tle of charity thrown over them by the friendly Dr. Doddridge was ill-deserved, as one discovers upon reading the simple and truthful story of the Ohio Indians as told in “ Colonel Smith’s Cap- tivity with the Indians,” probably the truest and most interesting picture of the life, manners, and customs of the Ohio tribes which we have.
But men of a better order superseded these. The Revolutionary War had hardly closed before thousands of the disbanded officers and soldiers were looking anxiously to the Western lands for new homes, or for means of repairing their shat- tered fortunes. In June, 1783, a strong memo- rial was sent to Congress asking a grant of the lands between the Ohio and Lake Erie. Those who lived in the South were fortunate in having immediate access to the lands of Kentucky, Tenn-
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essee, and the back parts of Georgia. The strife in Congress over the lands of the Northwest de- layed the surveys and the bounties so long that the soldiers of the North almost lost hope.
In 1785 General Rufus Putnam was appointed by Congress one of the surveyors of the Seven Ranges, but as he was engaged at the time in sim- ilar work for Massachusetts in the District of Maine, he obtained the appointment of General Benjamin Tupper temporarily in his place. Tupper entered immediately into the work, and on returning to Massachusetts at the close of the season, met General Putnam and gave him a full report of the country. The result was a meeting of officers and soldiers, chiefly of the Massachu- setts, Rhode Island and Connecticut lines, at Bos- ton, March 1, 1786, when they formed a new Ohio Company for the purchase and settlement of Western lands, in shares of one thousand dol- lars. General Putnam, General Samuel H. Par- sons, and the Rev. Manasseh Cutler were made the directors, and selected for their purchase the lands on the Ohio River situated on both sides of the Muskingum, and immediately west of the Seven Ranges.
The treasury board in those days were the commissioners of public lands, but with no pow- ers to enter into absolute sales unless such were approved by Congress. Weeks and months were lost in waiting for a quorum of that body to as- semble. This was effected on the lltli of July,
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and Dr. Cutler, deputed by his colleagues, was in attendance, but was constantly baffled in pursu- ing his objects. The difficulty was not so much in the passage of the ordinance by the govern- ment, for that went through unanimously on the 13th, as in closing the arrangements for purchas- ing the land. This was the first boon which Con- gress had to dispense, and it was disposed to make much of it. There were wheels within the wheel also, in respect to the offices to be conferred in the territory. The governorship had to be ad- justed. General Parsons was desired for the office by the Ohio Company. There was a coun- ter influence for General St. Clair, then president of Congress, though apparently he took no part in it. Another obstacle arose from rival combi- nations of speculators in Western lands; one of these consisting, as stated by Dr. Cutler, of a “ number of the principal characters in the city of New York,” where Congress was then sitting. These had the advantage of being represented by Colonel William Duer, then secretary of the treasury board.
The combination of obstacles was overcome by a secret arrangement which provided that St. Clair should be appointed governor, and the do- main of the Ohio Company enlarged by an addi- tion of land on the western side for the benefit of the New York Associates. The effect, as Dr. Cutler very candidly noted in his diary, was that “ matters went on much better.” But the conse-
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quences ultimately were unfortunate. St. Clair proved not to be the man for the place, and the hidden interest of the New-Yorkers, who never paid for their part of the purchase, led to the frauds practiced by the “ Scioto Company ” at Paris.
But Congress was still dilatory about the con- tract, though, as Dr. Cutler expressively says, u every machine in the city that it was possible to work was set in motion.” The members were disposed to insert conditions which were not satis- factory to the Ohio Company. But the doctor carried his point by formally intimating that he should retire, and seek better terms with some of the States, which were offering their lands at half the price Congress was to receive. The grant to the Ohio Company, upon the terms proposed, was voted by Congress, and the contract formally signed October 27, 1787, by the treasury board, and by Dr. Cutler and Winthrop Sargent as agents of the Ohio Company.
Two companies, including surveyors, boat-build- ers, carpenters, smiths, farmers and laborers, forty- eight persons in all, with their outfit, were sent forward in the following months of December and January, under General Putnam as leader and superintendent. They united in February on the Youghiogheny River and constructed boats. One was named the Mayflower, manifestly under the impression that they were going to wilds where no whites had yet existed. Embarking with their stores, they descended the Ohio, and on the 7th
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of April, 1788, landed at the Muskingum. On the upper point, opposite Fort Harmar, they founded their town, which at Boston had first been named Adelphia. At the first meeting of the directors, held on the ground July 2d, the name of Marietta was adopted, in honor of the French Queen Marie Antoinette, and compounded of the first and last syllables.
Under General Putnam’s vigorous management surveying, felling, and grubbing soon reduced the forest and ground to order. The farmers and builders were then set at work. A hundred and thirty acres of land were put under cultivation. The first building, a large one of hewn logs, two stories in height, with block-houses at the angles, was erected on the Campus Martius. This sur- mounted an ancient fortification of the Mound- builders, of which the parapets, twenty feet in height, still remained, crowned with trees of an- cient growth. Into this stronghold the women and children were immediately placed, as Indians were at hand. Captain Pipe happened at the time to be encamped near the fort with some dusky companions. In justice, it must be said that he had now ceased from mischief, and in his later days enjoyed the reputation of a virtuous and conservative old gentleman.
Thus much accomplished, Putnam proceeded to lay off the in-lots and out-lots of the town, for distribution. Numerous accessions of emigrants arrived, among whom in May came Colonel John
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May, tlie earliest journalist of the colony, and in June Judges Parsons and Varnum, all of them members, and the two latter directors, of the com- pany. The 4th of July was celebrated by the first pageant in the Northwest in its honor. There was a procession of the citizens and sol- diery, an eloquent oration by Judge Varnum, and a barbecue, the most ample that the river and the forest could supply. This was soon followed by the arrival of Governor St. Clair, and on the 17th of July the government of the Northwest Terri- tory was formally installed. Washington County, with its courts and officers, was established and set in motion, and at the end of the year the little capital could show a population of a hundred and thirty-two men, besides women and children. To these were added in the following year one hundred and fifty-two men, fifty-seven of them with families. Of what sort these people were, deserves to be learned from an eye-witness wholly disinterested. Major Denny, of the army, then posted at Fort Harmar, sets down these impres- sions in his diary : —
“ These men from New England, many of whom are of the first respectability, old revolutionary officers, erected and are now living in huts immediately opposite to us. A considerable number of industrious farmers purchased shares in the company, and more or less arrive every week. . . . These people appear the most happy folks in the world, greatly satisfied with their new pur- chase. They certainly are the best informed, most
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courteous and civil strangers of any I have yet met with. The order and regularity observed by all, their sober deportment, and perfect submission to the constituted au- thorities, must tend much to promote their settlements.”
Why these intelligent people should have pitched upon the hill country of the Muskingum and Hockhocking was long a marvel, though the later discoveries of the vast beds of iron, coal, and salt hidden in its depths has justified them as wiser than they knew. There was a tradition that Colonel Zane, of Wheeling, was consulted by them as a man thoroughly versed in the country, and that he advised them to go to the Miami valley. But as Captain Hutchins was supposed to know better, and General Parsons had been at Fort Finney the year before and should have known,, the shrewd Yankees suspected, it is said, that, as the Miamis were the great war-path of the Indians, Zane had a sinister design of placing them between himself and harm. Parsons, as one of the directors, had taken the responsibility in 1787 of opening negotiations with a committee of Congress for a purchase on the Scioto. But the Muskingum was so much preferred that the di- rectors took the business out of his hands.
The survey and distribution of the Ohio Com- pany’s lands brought so many emigrants to the Muskingum in 1790, that Marietta was increased to eighty houses. Settlements were extended to Belpre (Belle Prairie) and Newbury, twelve or fifteen miles down the Ohio, and to Big Bottom,
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thirty miles or more up the Muskingum. In January, 1791, General Putnam estimated that there were in these settlements two hundred and eighty men capable of bearing arms. The danger from the Indians was fearfully proved by the destruction of the upper settlement at Big Bottom, by Delawares and Wyandots, in January, 1791. Strong block-houses were erected at each of these points. At Belpre there were three, the largest of them known as the “ Farmers’ Castle.” This lovely border of the Ohio became famous for its orchards of the apple and peach, and just opposite was the island which in a few years was to be- come the famed home of the Blennerhassets.
Whatever their privations and dangers, the adventurers happily were spared any apprehen- sion of famine. Their fields and gardens were not only fruitful beyond their utmost expectation, but the abundance of fish, flesh, and fowl was simply prodigious. Buffalo, deer, and bear seemed to wait upon them. Geese, ducks, and pigeons swarmed. The fish fairly infested the rivers, and were of such superlative size that if the accounts of them were not sustained by concurrent state- ments of General Harmar, Major Denny, Dr. Hildreth, and other like authority, they might be set aside as fish stories. Colonel May asserts that a pike weighing one hundred pounds was served up at the Fourth of July barbecue, and catfish of sixty and eighty pounds were often caught. An- other pleasing reminiscence of the colonel’s is that this barbecue lasted until midnight.
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Meanwhile the Miamis, though slighted by the Ohio Company, had fallen into other hands, and soon took the first honors away from the Muskin- gum. The settlers to this section came, as it were by chance, from New Jersey. It will be remem- bered that, in the fierce conflict between the In- dians and Kentuckians, this valley, and particu- larly the lower part along the Ohio, converging on the Licking, had become exceedingly danger- ous, and indeed was a sealed book little known to the whites. The constant raids back and forth had given it the terrible appellation of the “ Mi- ami Slaughter House.” Still one wonders that whole fleets of pioneers should have floated past a spot presenting to their eye such attractions of fertility and beauty as that which lay between the two Miamis. General William Lytle relates that in April, 1780, a fleet of sixty-three boats, filled with emigrants and their families, more than a thousand fighting-men among them, were approaching the point where Cincinnati stands, when their pilot boats gave signals that a num- ber of Indians were encamped on the north bank, opposite the Licking, and preparing to attack. The fleet landed half a mile above, and five hun- dred men went to encounter them. The Indians quickly discovered that they were outnumbered, and fled up Mill Creek too rapidly for their pur- suers, though followed for four or five miles. Only two months later Captain Bird, in com- mand of six hundred Indians and Canadians,
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with artillery, came down the Big Miami and as- cended the Licking. Many collisions occurred in this vicinity, but not between forces of such mag- nitude. One of the most fatal was in March, 1788, when three boats were captured near the Big Miami, containing Mr. Samuel Purviance, a prominent citizen of Baltimore, with four or five gentlemen from Maryland, Mons. Ragant and two other French gentlemen, mineralogists and bota- nists on an exploring expedition, with eight or ten other persons ; all except two were killed or cap- tured. The fate of Mr. Purviance was never as- certained, though General Harmar made a long but fruitless search.
But in the summer of 1786, whilst Dr. Cutler was wrestling with Congress for the Muskingum purchase, if not earlier, Benjamin Stites, a trader from New Jersey, happened to be at Washington, a few miles back of Limestone (Maysville), and as a volunteer joined a party of Kentuckians in pursuit of some Indians who had stolen their horses. The thieves were traced down to the Little Miami, where on rafts they had crossed the Ohio, swimming the horses. Following their example, the pursuit was continued so far that the Kentuckians gave it up, but, at the instance of Stites, crossed over to the Big Miami, and thus he gained a view of the rich valleys formed by these rivers.
Possessed of this knowledge, he returned with- out delay to New Jersey, and confided his discov-
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ery to Mr. John Cleves Symmes and other men of influence. An association of twenty-four pro- prietors, much in the form of the Ohio Company, was formed, among whom were General Jonathan Dayton, Elias Boudinot, and Dr. Witherspoon, as well as Symmes and Stites. To make sure of the scheme before entering into it, Symmes made a journey to the Ohio, descending to the falls, with a special eye to the shore between the Mi- amis. The associates, being convinced by his report that Stites had not overdrawn the picture, resolved to proceed. A petition was presented by Symmes to Congress, August 29, 1787, on be- half of himself and associates, that the Treasury Board be authorized to make them a grant, on the same terms as had been conceded to the Ohio Company, for all the lands on the Ohio between the two Miamis, bounded on the north by an ex- tension of the north line of the purchase of the Ohio Company, except that instead of appropriat- ing two townships as in that grant for a univer- sity, one only should be set apart in the Miami purchase for the use of an academy.
It does not appear, so imperfectly were the journals of Congress kept, that this petition was granted, nor is it even on record that it was pre- sented. Circumstances, however, show that it was referred to the Treasury Board about October 23, for action at their discretion, and that there were negotiations between them and Symmes on the subject. But without awaiting their decision,
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and in a credulous reliance that the grant would be just what he had asked, Sy mines proceeded as though the bargain were closed, and on the 9th of November gave Stites a covenant for ten thou- sand acres of the best lands in the valley, at the price of five shillings an acre, payable in certifi- cates of the public debt. This was the medium in which the government had agreed to receive payment for the Muskingum purchase, the price being two thirds of a dollar per acre. Symmes expected the same.
He issued a prospectus, also, on the 26th of that month, announcing that a contract had been entered into between himself and associates and the Treasury Board, and inviting all persons to take their choice of any township, section or quar- ter section in the whole extent of country for which he had applied, the whole being about two million acres, which, until the 1st of May follow- ing, he announced could be had, subject to prior applications, at the price of two thirds of a dollar per acre. The price after that period was to be a dollar per acre. He reserved for himself, as the site for a town he proposed to lay out, the nearest entire township at the confluence of the Big Mi- ami and the Ohio, and the fractional townships on the north, south, and west sides of it. In this town every alternate lot was offered, free of charge, to applicants who should within two years build a house or cabin thereon, and occupy it with a fam- ily for three years. The prospectus was twenty-
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two pages in length, and promised health, wealth, and blessings too numerous to be recounted.
On such terms of picking and choosing, ap- plicants were plenty. The best lands were soon taken. Among others, Matthias Denman, of New Jersey, took up the entire section of land immedi- ately opposite the mouth of the Licking River. He also had a town in view. In those days there was no surer card for a new town than to place it at the mouth of a river.
The improvidence and mismanagement of Symmes were all at once divulged, and it caused immeasurable misfortune to him, and loss to the people who had trusted to his lavish proposals. The Treasury Board refused to concede the entire front on the Ohio, and would execute no contract at all, until October 15, 1788, when General Day- ton and Daniel Marsh intervened between them and Symmes in behalf of the associates. The board consented to a grant limited strictly to twenty miles on the Ohio, beginning at the mouth of the Big Miami, and to be measured “ along the several courses thereof ; ” the inte- rior, between the Big Miami and a line extend- ing parallel with its general course northwardly from this twenty-mile point, to be bounded north by a line which would include a million acres. In other words, the commissioners were unwilling to part with so much front upon the Ohio as Symmes demanded.
This excluded the lands sold to Stites and
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many others, on or near the Little Miami, and be- yond this north line. It also dropped the acad- emy township. Congress and the local courts, in which Symmes was one of the judges, were plagued for years by the animosities and litiga- tion growing out of violated contracts, between him and his vendees, creditors, and associates. The subject properly belongs to another chap- ter on the land system of the State. It may be said, however, that all contentions were finally adjusted in May, 1792, by acts of Congress, which extended the Miami purchase along the Ohio the entire distance between the two Mi- amis, but limited on the north by a line extend- ing due east and west, between these rivers, so as to include 248,540 acres, besides reservations, that being the entire quantity for which Symmes and his associates had paid the stipulated price. The reservations were three sections in each township for the United States, — one for the purposes of religion, one for schools, one complete township for an academy and other public schools and seminaries of learning, a lot one mile square at the mouth of the Big Miami, and one of fif- teen acres for Fort Washington. The people who had purchased lands from Symmes beyond these limits were granted the right of preemption on further payment to the government of two dollars per acre. Thus ended the unhappy con- troversy for which Judge Symmes, in his will, left an imprecation upon the ingratitude of his coun-
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try men, but which in truth was attributable to his own utter want of method or judgment in matters of business.
Returning now to the various schemes for towns in the Miami purchase, we find Symmes, Stites, and Denman all busy , in the summer of 1788, organiz- ing their plans for the favor of posterity. Stites was foremost, and with a strong party of friends and followers, and provided with everything ready for clearing and building, he landed, November 18,1788, just below the Little Miami, and in a few days had housed and fortified his company against the enemy. He gave his town the name of Columbia.
Symmes and his party were at Limestone, with Stites, but waiting for the military escort to guard them at Fort Finney. He might have gone there as safely as Stites. Denman also arrived, bring- ing neither colony nor supplies. But with skill- ful generalship he executed a flank movement by which he gained valuable auxiliaries and strength. He there met Colonel Robert Patterson, of Lex- ington, Kentucky, who was himself meditating a purchase from Symmes. Denman accompanied him to Lexington, and there formed a partnership with Patterson and John Filson in the town site which he had secured, opposite the mouth of the Licking. Colonel Patterson was a native of Penn- sylvania, but had emigrated to Kentucky at an early period, and became a distinguished officer in the battles and expeditions against the Indians
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and English. He was the founder of Lexington. Filson was from Chester, Pennsylvania, and com- menced life as a schoolmaster. Like many of that profession he had turned surveyor and emi- grated to Kentucky. Besides being a consider- able dealer in lands, he had, in 1784, published the first account of Boone, and the settlement of Kentucky.
These three entered into articles, headed “ with reference to Losantiville,” formally executed Au- gust 25th, by which Denman, in consideration of twenty pounds, Virginia currency, to be paid by Patterson and Filson, transferred to each an equal interest with himself in the section of land oppo- site the mouth of the Licking. They agreed to lay out a town and establish a ferry there, and that “ every institution, determination, and regulation concerning it should be the result of the united advice and concert of the parties.” To Filson was committed the framing of the town plat, and he took Philadelphia for his model. The name of Losantiville was adopted. This has been denied by some of the antiquaries, but the paper signed by the proprietors is conclusive. This they ad- vertised in the “ Kentucky Gazette,” August 30. The 15th of September was the day appointed for a large company to meet at Lexington, and make a road to the mouth of Licking, provided Judge Symmes should arrive. Thirty in-lots of half an acre each, and the same number of out-lots, four acres each, were offered as free gifts to such set-
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tiers as should become residents before the first day of April following. In the next paper, Colo- nel Patterson announced that the departure of the company was postponed to September 18th, in order to meet Judge Symmes at the place on Monday the 22d, “and the business will then go on as proposed.”
On the 22d of September, 1788, a large com- pany of Kentuckians, with Colonel Patterson and Filson at their head, arrived on the ground, and were there met by Judge Symmes and Israel Ludlow, chief surveyor of the Miami Associates, who, with Denman, came down from Limestone. The parties and interests thus assembled on what is now the public landing or quay of Cincinnati, pursuant to authority derived through Symmes and the public dedication by the proprietors, formulated by Filson’s plat, though not so stately a pageant as that in July at Marietta, were the inauguration of Cincinnati. It was impossible to proceed to the immediate location of the plat, and the donation of lots, or settlement, was not to take place until the 1st of April following. The sur- veys could not be commenced, nor Denman’s sec- tion fixed, until the twenty-mile point was ascer- tained, which was to be the key to the whole en- terprise.
Ludlow was immediately detached for this pur- pose, and in a few days “took the meanders ” of the Ohio. This measurement proved that Den- man was within the line. He and a number of
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the guests remained encamped on the ground where Colonel Clarke’s blockhouse, erected in 1780, was still standing. Judge Symmes, with Patterson, Filson, and a large number of the Ken- tuckians, rode out twenty miles to examine the country. On the Big Miami they encountered an encampment of Shawanees. The Kentuckians instinctively proposed to open an attack, but were forbidden by Symmes. He had assured the In- dians of peace. This interference was so offensive to the border men that nearly all wheeled about and returned to the camp. Filson became alarmed, “ had no rest afterwards,” as Symmes subsequently reported, “ and attempting to escape to the body of men left at the Ohio, was destroyed by the sav- ages.” As to this nothing more is known than that on the reassembling of the parties Filson was missing. To this day his actual fate remains a mystery.
This, however, by no means defeated the dedi- cation of Losantiville ; a ridiculous compound of French, Latin, and Greek by the unfortunate schoolmaster intending to signify “ the town op- posite the mouth of the Licking.” 1 The assem- bly separated, but in Patterson’s phrase, “the business went on.” Symmes, Denman, and Lud- low returned to Limestone with Patterson, and there effected an arrangement by which Ludlow acquired Filson’s interest and became the surveyor and principal agent in the town affair. Denman 1 Lacking] os-anti-ville.
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returned to New Jersey. Patterson and Ludlow, with a party of twelve, chiefly surveyors and as- sistants, returned to Losantiville. Symmes re- ported that they left Limestone December 24th, to form a station and lay out the town. The time of their arrival is supposed to date the settlement of Cincinnati, but exactly when it was has baffled all research. Mr. Perkins, in his 44 Annals of the West,” incomparably the most intelligent guide in the early history of the West, has noted it as a curious fact that 44 the date of the settlement of Cincinnati is unknown, though we have the tes- timony of the very men who made it.”
Symmes still tarried at Limestone, waiting for the treaty of Fort Harmar, and particularly for the army contractor who was to bring supplies for his guard of soldiers. In the latter part of January, 1789, came a flood in the Ohio, the great- est that had been known, and big also with con- sequences to the three rival towns. It began to subside on the 29th, and Symmes embarked with his colony for Miami City. They found Colum- bia submerged, only one house having escaped. 44 Losantiville suffered nothing,” he said, 44 from the fresh.” In truth, there was nothing there to suffer. But as they approached Miami City they found it to be a dreary waste of backwater. The fleet stopped at North Bend. The disaster was not only fatal to the embryo metropolis, but Fort Finney being made untenantable, Captain Kersey with his soldiers abandoned Svmmes, and betook
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himself to the post at the falls of the Ohio. It was a serious blow to Symmes’ hopes and pros- pects. In a letter to the Secretary of War he cen- sured Kersey, and also complained of the retain- ing of the strong garrison at Fort Harmar ; urging that the Miami settlements be at once sustained.
His associates joined in this urgent request, but the consequence was even more untoward. Major Doughty was sent down in August, to “ choose ground and lay out a new work for the protection of the people settled in Judge Symmes’ pur- chase.” He arrived at the Little Miami on the 16th ; and after reconn oitering for three tdays, down to the Big Miami, for an eligible situation, reported on the 21st to Colonel Harmar that he had “ fixed upon a spot opposite to the Licking River, which was high and healthy, abounding with never-failing springs, and the most proper position he could find for the purpose.”
This settled the question. Whatever Cincin- nati may have suffered since by floods, she un- doubtedly owes her start to that of 1789. Major Doughty, with two companies, under Captains Ferguson and Strong and Quartermaster Pratt, companies containing a number of artificers and mechanics, took possession of the ground on the Ohio immediately east of the town plat, and built Fort Washington on the second or upper bank. As described by Colonel Harmar, it was a solid, substantial fortress of hewn timber, about one hundred and eighty feet square, with block- houses at the four angles, and two stories high.
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On the 29th of December Colonel Harmar occupied the new fort as headquarters, with the larger part of his regiment, leaving two compa- nies at Fort Harmar. On the 2d of January, 1790, Governor St. Clair arrived on a tour to the French posts at the West, and spent three days in establishing the county of Hamilton. On this occasion, as already noted, the name of Losanti- ville was changed to that of Cincinnati. Judge Symmes, who had part in the occasion, wrote on the 9th, “The governor has made Losantiville the county town by the name of Cincinnati, so that Losantiville will become extinct.” The gov- ernor oddly enough omitted in his diary any men- tion of this visit.
Cincinnati for some years was but a garrison town, without the better class of settlers who had come to Marietta, Columbia, and North Bend. The houses were but cabins and the inhabitants migratory. General Harrison’s description of Cincinnati at this time indicates that the curtain might as well be drawn. He arrived as a young ensign in November, 1791, and reported to Gen- eral Harmar just as the wretched remnants of St. Clair’s rout were coming in. “ The village, then composed of twenty-five or thirty cabins,” he says, “ afforded nothing to relieve their wants. But the inhabitants, as well as the sutlers, ap- peared to have an abundant supply of whiskey, for which their unhappy victims exchanged the remains of their scanty pay. I certainly saw
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more drunken men in the forty-eight hours suc- ceeding my arrival at Cincinnati than I had in all my previous life.” This was the blighting effect of the war. But in three years Cincinnati must have worn a different aspect. In 1793, one of the infantry officers in Wayne’s army tauntingly writes to his comrades, the dragoons, across the river, u We have taken quarters at Munson’s tav- ern, where we live in clover.” It was not until the treaty of Greenville, however, that it acquired any growth. The population in 1800 was but seven hundred and fifty.
Dr. Goforth, the most respectable physician at that time in Ohio, describing the settlements in a letter to a friend, besides the places already referred to, mentions South Bend on the Ohio, Dunlap’s Station or Colerain on the Big Miami, and Covalt’s Station on the Little Miami. The “ Stations ” were strong buildings of logs in the fashion of blockhouses, the upper story projecting over the lower story and pierced with loopholes for riflemen. To these, in case of alarm, the neighboring farmers betook themselves with their families. They were impregnable to the Indians, except by fire communicated by arrows.
Farther up the Ohio emigrants of another sort had arrived, people born to misfortune. They were refugees from France, who, fleeing the im- pending reign of terror at Lyons and Paris, had been trapped by sharpers, who pretended, under the name and title of the Scioto Company, to
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sell them lands on the Ohio River. How that company originated, and clothed itself with the pretense of title, under which the frauds were perpetrated, has been explained in part. The purchase by the Ohio Company was enlarged, it will be remembered, to make room for some New Yorkers, represented by Colonel Duer. Congress authorized a sale of all the land between the Seven Ranges and the Scioto River. This was divided by the Treasury Board into two contracts, but of the same date. One included a tract on the Ohio River, bounded on the east by the seven ranges (five or six miles above Marietta), west by the west line of the seventeenth range, and north by a line which would include a million and a half acres, besides reservations. The reservations were two townships for a university, and five sec- tions out of every other township ; two of which were for the support of religion and public schools, and the other three for disposal by Congress. The other contract included the lands between the seventeenth range and the Scioto River. By a special article in the first-mentioned contract, the Ohio Company were admitted at once to the pos- session and use of the lands east of the west line of the fifteenth range, containing half the pur- chase. A circumstance material to be observed is that the west line of this fifteenth range inter- sects the Ohio below Gallipolis.
Two days after these contracts were executed, the agents of the Ohio Company transferred the
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western portion in accordance with the arrange- ment already made between Dr. Cutler and Colo- nel Duer. The transaction, so far, seems to have been approved by a meeting of the directors of the Ohio Company on the 21st of November, at Boston. Under these arrangements, apparently, an association of persons at New York, styled the Scioto Company, sent Mr. Joel Barlow as their agent to Europe, in June, 1788, to dispose of these lands. He some time afterwards employed as assistants De Saisson, a Frenchman, and Wil- liam Playfair, a civil engineer, residing at Paris. Playfair was a brother of the distinguished mathe- matician of Edinburgh, and had a conspicuous hand in the destruction of the Bastile. Advertisements and maps of a highly imaginary colony were circulated, and lands on the Belle Riviere were offered for sale at tempting rates. They were represented as being immediately adjacent to the settled and cultivated country, and having charms of climate, health, and scenery such as to rival Arcadia or the Yale of Tempe. Hundreds of peo- ple seeking for chances to emigrate were thus inveigled to the Ohio.
It is usually stated that their emigration oc- curred in 1790, but Governor St. Clair, in his re- port to the President at New York, just before Harmar’s campaign, stated that a considerable number had arrived in the territory in the fall of the year previous. On his late return from the West he had found about four hundred of them at
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a place three miles below the Kanawha, which they had named Gallipolis. A hundred more were waiting at Marietta, and another hundred were on their way through Pennsylvania. They were living in long rows of cabins provided for them by the Scioto Company. They seemed to him to have no useful employment, and were not only discontented, but many of them were dis- posed to be mutinous. He had stopped to make them a visit, and immediately on landing a depu- tation waited upon him and presented a paper in which they recited their wrongs. As he was wholly unacquainted with their contracts, and did not choose to rely upon their statements, nor on those of the agent of the Scioto Company, who was residing there, he had entreated them to have patience until the matter could be investigated by the proper authorities. But as they were in great dread of the Indians he had advised them to or- ganize themselves at once for defense, as well as for their own peace and order, by selecting offi- cers, civil and military. He had directed that they should send him the names of these as soon as practicable, that he might regularly appoint them.
These people were not all carvers, gilders, pe- ruke-makers, or pastry cooks, as often represented. Many were farmers and mechanics, and some were men of education and capacity. But it does not appear that, as a community, they made any effort to help themselves out of the difficulty into which
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they had been duped. Their project, if they had any, was sunk and lost, as Governor St. Clair ap- prehended, in “ disappointment and chagrin. An interested speculation of a few men, pursued,” as he said, “ with too great avidity, reflected some disgrace upon the American character, while it in- volved numbers in absolute ruin, in a foreign land.”
This scandalous transaction for a while excited intense indignation. But it was so skillfully smothered by the donation of land which Con- gress made in March, 1795, to relieve the survi- vors, and known as the French Grant, that it is difficult to trace with accuracy who were the con- trivers and perpetrators of the cruel swindle. A retributory feature in it was that the sub-agents also swindled the principals. The most authentic statement, perhaps, is a report by the Attorney General to the Senate, in March, 1794, upon the petition of the French for relief. Only a few of its points can be mentioned.
That to which he called attention, among the first, was that the town and lands just below the Kanawha, to which the emigrants had been sent by Colonel Duer on landing, were not in the tract originally assigned to the Scioto Company, but farther up the river, and much within the limits of the Ohio Company’s land. The Ohio Company, he observed, had made no objection to this for some time, notwithstanding the notoriety of the fact. This had been explained by the
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statement of a member of Congress, that the orig- inal purchase by Duer and his associates had be- come impracticable by the great rise in the price of certificates, and that a new arrangement had been made to accommodate the French immigration.
The new arrangement was a sale by the Ohio Company to the Scioto Company of a tract of one hundred thousand acres at the west end of their lands. This included the lands at and near to Gallipolis, so conspicuously pointed out in the maps and deeds which Barlow and his brokers at Paris * had been issuing. The deed for this purpose had once been seen, the attorney-general stated, by a committee of the House of Repre- sentatives, and he was satisfied that it was an absolute conveyance. This deed had since been given up and cancelled, on the ground that the purchase money had not been paid. On this latter point there was no evidence. No one had appeared for the Ohio Company in the investi- gation.
Another surprising point in this report is the version it gives of that very obscure subject, the original transfer by the Ohio Company to Duer and his associates. There was a separate con- tract, as we have seen, between the Treasury Board and the Ohio Company for that part of the grant by Congress which lay between the seventeenth range and the Scioto River. The attorney-general found that it had not been trans- ferred to Duer and his associates, entire. The
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transfer, made two days after the Ohio Company acquired the contract, was but of a moiety only. A half, therefore, was retained, and it was agreed that Messrs. Cutler and Sargent and their asso- ciates should have an interest in the profits aris- ing from the sales, and that Duer should employ agents and manage the disposal of the lands in Europe or elsewhere. To secure the Ohio Com- pany in their right of preemption, which was dependent upon a further payment of five hun- dred thousand dollars, in certificates, to the Treas- ury Board, Duer engaged to advance them one hundred thousand dollars, part of which was to be reimbursed by subscriptions to be raised by the agents of the Ohio Company.
Whether or no these transactions of their agents were authorized by the Ohio Company, the attor- ney-general left undetermined, like the question as to the consideration of the deed, for the want of proper evidence. He points to it, however, as a significant circumstance, that the agents of the Ohio Company two years previously, when soliciting the donation of one hundred thousand acres of land which Congress voted to them April 21, 1792, had stated this grant to the Scioto Company and the loss they were likely to sus- tain by it, in order to enforce their claim be- fore a committee of the House of Representatives. This, perhaps, was the occasion when the deed was seen. Another circumstance indicating how closely the agents and officers of the Ohio Com-
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pany were identified in laying out the town and disposing of the lands at Gallipolis appears in General Putnam’s superintendence. It was through him, as appears by the statement of Mr. J. P. R. Bureau, one of the most respectable of the French settlers, that Major Burnham and a considerable force of mechanics and laborers were employed previously to the arrival of the French to clear the land and erect the cabins, block- houses, etc., for their reception. It seems, also, from General Harmar’s correspondence, that Gen- eral Putnam was soliciting subscriptions in June, 1790, for shares in the “ Scioto speculation.”
The attorney-general, assuming the facts, con- cluded that the French settlers might have a valid title in equity against the Ohio Company for their lands. But as there was no court in the Northwest Territory competent to determine such cases, and any further delay or uncertainty added to the distress which they had already undergone must be fatal, he recommended the grant of lands which the petitioners sought. Con- gress adopted his view and appropriated a tract of twenty-four thousand acres of land on the banks of the Ohio (in Lawrence County), to be divided in equal lots among the French inhabitants act- ually remaining at Gallipolis November 1, 1794, all widows and all male persons above the age of eighteen years participating. An addition of twelve hundred acres was granted for some who had been prevented from sharing in the first grant.
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It was of little avail. The sufferers, most of them, were scattered, in despondency, or dead, be- fore the relief came, and those who received it were not much better off than before. They were visited in the summer of 1796 by their coun- tryman, Volney, who found them still at Galli- polis, forlorn in appearance, with pale faces, sickly looks, and anxious air, still inhabiting a double row of whitewashed log huts, patched with clay, damp, unwholesome, and uncomfortable. But, he concludes, that severe as the hardship was for men brought up in the ease and indo- lence of Paris, to chop trees, to plow, to sow, to reap, to labor in the field or the barn, in a tem- perature of eighty-five to ninety-five degrees, it was in some degree imputable to their own infat- uation, as the French had no faculty like that of the English, Irish, or German emigrants for set- tling a new country. A visit to Vincennes con- vinced him that Gallipolis was a mistake.
Among the men of superior intelligence and po- sition who were victimized in this knavery, none better deserves mention than the Count Malar- tie. He was a soldier, and happened to descend the Ohio with some of the officers who were about to join in General St. Clair’s campaign. He volunteered his services, and was appointed one of St. Clair’s aids. In the defeat, November 4, 1791, he was wounded, but escaped the mas- sacre. His gallantry won him great credit. He was soon recalled to France in the king’s service,
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and was again wounded in battle, besides losing most of his fortune by confiscation. But he re- tained his admiration for American democracy. In a letter to Governor St. Clair, deploring the excesses of the French, he exclaimed, 44 Here they cut each other’s throats, each struggling for the power. Yours is the only country to live in.”
So far, the Virginians had been interdicted by a resolution of Congress (July 17, 1788) from entering lands north of the Ohio on their mili- tary warrants, as these were to be available only when there was a deficiency of good lands in Ken- tucky. Surveys and entries, nevertheless, had been made the first, it is said, on August 1, 1787, at the mouth of Eagle Creek. But the restriction ceased August 1, 1790. In December, Nathaniel Massie, a Virginian, one of the first and most enterprising surveyors and land operators in the district, established the town of Massie ville (Manchester), twelve miles above Maysville, where thirty families were settled in a well-pick- eted stockade and blockhouse ; the station of the greatest danger, probably, on the river.
From the year 1787 to 1796, that is to say, more than half the interval between Governor St. Clair’s inauguration and the formation of Ohio as a State, this thin fringe of villages and adjacent settlements along the north bank of the Ohio, with a white population of not more than five thousand all told, was the inception of the new State which, in a few years, was to reach from the Ohio to Lake Erie.
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The Lake Shore was as yet wholly avoided. Under French and English rule it had all the at- traction, and the Ohio none. The inversion was due chiefly to the menacing border of English and Indians, but in no small degree to the preten- tious sovereignty still kept up by Connecticut. This was a “ barren sceptre ” every way, but a rare example how persistence may wear away rocks.
The untimely tenacity of Connecticut during the war, and the subsequent effort of Congress to quiet the title of the United States, had so far yielded, as already seen, that in September, 1786, Congress accepted a qualified cession from Con- necticut of all territory south of the forty-first degree of latitude, and west of a line one hundred and twenty miles west of Pennsylvania. The space thus left became known as the Connecticut or Western Reserve. A tract of one hundred miles, next west of Pennsylvania, had been re- leased by Connecticut in 1755 to one Samuel Hazard, on condition that the king should grant a patent. His son Samuel applied to the Con- necticut assembly in 1774 for a confirmation, rep- resenting that three or four thousand people, if it were granted, would remove there and form a colony. This was refused.
In May, 1792, a donation of half a million acres, at the west end of the Reserve, was be- stowed by Connecticut upon her citizens who had suffered by “ incursions of the enemy during the
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late war,” and hence known as the Firelands. The remainder of the tract between the lake and the forty-first degree of latitude, estimated to be 3,200,000 acres, was sold by Connecticut in 1795 to the Connecticut Land Company, composed of about three hundred and twenty of the wealthier citizens of the State. The price was $1,200,000, and this was converted into a state school-fund. The two companies were formally incorporated by Connecticut, who thus kept up her form or show of jurisdiction, but after the establishment of Ohio as a State they were obliged to rehabili- tate themselves with new charters and powers. These pretensions seriously hindered the settle- ment of the country. Few of the proprietors in either of the companies seemed disposed to risk their lives or happiness in seeking homes on their lands, and few people were disposed to buy their titles. The first settlement or landing of Connecticut people in the Reserve was on July 4, 1796, at the mouth of Conneaut Creek, the northeast corner of Ohio. It was a company of fifty-two persons, two of them women, led by Moses Cleaveland, a lawyer of Canterbury, Con- necticut, and a pioneer of whom the people of the Lake Shore justly pride themselves. He was sent out as the general agent of the Connecticut Land Company, with Augustus Porter as chief, and five others as assistant surveyors. These and their assistants composed the party, Joshua Stowe being the commissary. Their first essay
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was to celebrate the day with double honors. Though the feast they spread was not as ample as that which at Marietta had inaugurated the Fourth of July in the Northwest, it was worthy of that patriotism and pride with which the day was kept for two generations in Ohio.
The next morning they proceeded to the erec- tion of 44 Stowe Castle,” a log edifice sufficiently commodious to hold the commissary’s stores, and afford a shelter for the mothers and their children. A harmless band of Indians (Massassaugas) oc- cupied the vicinity. Porter and his assistants began work by establishing the south line of the Connecticut claim, along the forty-first parallel, from the west boundary of Pennsjdvania to the Indian line, just established between the Cuya- hoga and the Tuscarawas. In fixing the initial point at the Pennsylvania line, it has been stoutly insisted of late that by imperfection of instruments half a mile too much was taken, though corrected as the line approached the port- age. But the error is as stoutly denied. The southeastern townships of the Connecticut claim were also laid off, and one of them immediately secured by John Young, the founder of Youngs- town.
Thus much accomplished, the surveyors pro- ceeded up the Lake Shore to the Cuyahoga River, where the western point had long been a depot for the Detroit and Pittsburgh traders. Cleave- land’s surveyors landed on the opposite point and
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laid out the town. In his honor, as representa- tive of the proprietors, his name was given to it, but stands transformed to Cleveland. The drop- ping of a letter was necessitated, it is said, to fit the headline of the small sheet on which the first newspaper of the town was printed.
Until the following year two families consti- tuted the town. The western point was, and long had been, a place of consequence to the In- dians as well as to traders. Evan’s map of 1755 marks a “ French house” near there. At a later period Duncan and Wilson, the largest traders between Pittsburgh and Detroit, erected a log warehouse for the business which was carried by horse trains between those points. Zeisberger and his little band of refugees also made their landing here in 1786, when they returned from Detroit and Canada to seek their old homes.
Here the colonization of New Connecticut halted for some years, under adverse circum- stances. In the mean time events of importance occurred upon the Ohio* to which it will be neces- sary now to return.
CHAPTER IX.
ST. CLAIR’S ADMINISTRATION AND THE INDIAN WAR.
The first government of the Northwest Terri- tory was committed by Congress, in October, 1787, to Arthur St. Clair as governor, and Samuel H. Parsons, John Armstrong, and James W. Varnum as judges, Winthrop Sargent being appointed secretary. Armstrong declined, and in February, 1788, John Cleves Symmes was appointed in his place.
All of them but Symmes had served actively in the army of the Revolution, St. Clair as a major- general, Parsons and Varnum as brigadiers. St. Clair was of a distinguished Scotch family, and came early in life to America as an ensign in Amherst's army. At the close of the French and Indian war he married a lady of Boston, purchased lands in western Pennsylvania, and there made his home. In the hot contentions between the Penns and the Virginia governors for possession of the heads of the Ohio River, St. Clair sup- ported his governor with a degree of ardor so of- fensive to Dunmore, that the Virginian demanded his dismissal from office. Penn mildly replied
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that he could not be spared. From the com- mencement of the colonial troubles he was equally ardent in the patriot party. At the time he was chosen governor of the Northwest Territory he was President of Congress.
The new governor did not enter the field until the following summer. On the Ohio the situation was thought hopeful, though danger lurked on every side. There were military posts at Pitts- burgh, Fort McIntosh, Fort Harmar, Fort Steu- ben (Falls of the Ohio), and at Vincennes, but all were dependent for their garrisons upon the ten companies of Lieutenant-Colonel Harmar’s regi- ment, which then composed the entire army of the United States. There were villages at various points, chiefly those of Wheeling, Kanawha, and Limestone (Maysville). Thirty thousand people were estimated to have gone to the interior of Kentucky, but how fearfully they were suffering appears from a letter of Judge Innes to the Secre- tary of War, in 1790, which stated that in the seven previous years fifteen hundred men, women, and children had been slain, or carried captive, by the Indians, and thousands of horses, and fifty thousand dollars of other property, plundered or destroyed.
The country north of the Ohio was, in 1788, a hostile land. There were squatters and villages, but no regular community except the little colony just forming under the guns of Fort Harmar. The Moravians were on the Huron and Cuyahoga
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rivers, struggling to regain their lost homes on the Tuscarawas. The French were living in their old villages and farms at Detroit and the posts on the Wabash and Mississippi. But the banks of the Ohio were infested with Indian war parties, determined to hold the river, and filled with implacable hatred of the Americans, especially the Virginians, or Long Knives. They were in- cited and supported by the officers and emissaries of the British government in Canada, who were equally embittered by the alleged perfidy of the United States in violating the treaty stipulations in favor of the loyalists and British creditors. Upon this pretext Great Britain withheld the posts at Detroit, Sandusky, and the Maumee, and from these vantage-points kept control of the Indian confederation, and of all the Lake Shore from Niagara up to Mackinac.
This was the field of operations to which St. Clair was sent, with his cabinet and legislature of judges. He was also special commissioner to make treaties for peace with the Indians, and therefore was still further embarrassed by the bloody war of retaliation going on between them and the Kentuckians. As to the true balance of right and wrong, Judge Innes’ lamentation would be imperfectly understood without at least a glance at the raids which the Kentuckians were making across the Ohio. In the years to which he refers there had been a dozen of these hostile expeditions. They form conspicuous chapters in
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the early history of Ohio, but only a rapid survey is possible here.
They began with an incursion by Boone, accom- panied by twenty men, to Paint Creek, in 1778, which was suddenly checked by meeting a large force of Canadians and Indians on their way to Kentucky. By a rapid retreat to Boonesborough, Boone and his men made ready and saved it from destruction. In the next year Colonel Bowman attacked and destroyed the old Chillicothe town above Xenia. In the summer of 1780 General Clarke (George Rogers) assembled two regiments under Colonels Logan and Linn, with artillery, at the mouth of the Licking, to attack the Shawa- nees town on Mad River (near Springfield). De- spite the secrecy which they used and their rapid march, the Indians had spied his movement and fled. Their towns were reduced to ashes, their cornfields and gardens laid waste, and the large force returned with this barren result to Ken- tucky. Immediately after the bloody disaster at the Blue Licks, in 1782, General Clarke and his brigade, under Colonels Floyd and Logan, pursued the Indians and overtook the rear, with their spoils, just as they reached the Mad River towns. Many of them were killed or captured, but they vanished, as before, leaving their fields and cabins to destruction. Colonel Logan was detached to attack the upper town at Piqua, on the Big Miami. This and Loramie’s store were both destroyed. This Frenchman and his store were
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not at Piqua, as sometimes stated, but on the west fork of the Miami, fifteen or twenty miles above ; a noted rendezvous of the hostile savages, and a landmark in the treaties. The quick pursuit and revenge thus inflicted for the defeat at the Blue Licks cowed the Shawanees, so that for a while their great incursions into Kentucky were discontinued. But the murders and robbery by marauding parties, constantly kept up, led to two more expeditions in October, 1786: one under General Clarke to punish the tribes on the Wa- bash ; the other under Colonel Logan, in support of Clarke’s movement, which again attacked those at the head of Mad River. These scattered as usual, but Logan pursued them up to the Maca- cheek towns, destroying them and capturing some prisoners. An interesting sketch of this expedi- tion has been left by General William Lytle, who served in it, though but a boy of sixteen years. Two further expeditions were made against the Indians on the Scioto in 1786 and 1790; the former by Colonel Todd, and the latter by Gen- eral Scott, aided by Colonel Harmar and a party of regular troops, but without any material result. Separate expeditions equally unimportant were conducted by General Scott and Colonel Wilkin- son against the Wabash Indians, in the summer of 1791.
These dashes, as they were called, serve to show what a wild and aimless but mutually exas- perating method of warfare harried the banks of
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the Ohio for many years. They were not merely inconsequential but injurious ; provoking constant retaliation, inflicting injury, without conquest or any actual victory over the Indians.
From this exhibition we get a conception of what Governor St. Clair had before him when he landed at the Muskingum, July 9, 1788, saluted by the guns of the fort, and cordially hailed by the village of three months’ growth, which, for the present, was the capital of the Northwest. Judges Parsons and Varnum had preceded him. Colo- nel Sargent, the secretary, arrived on the 15th, bearing the official transcript of the Ordinance, and the commissions of the governor and judges. An assembly of the inhabitants and the garrison was immediately convoked, at which the governor presided, attended by the judges ; and these cre- dentials being publicly read and proclaimed, the government of the Northwest Territory, parent of many States, was inaugurated.
The governor’s first step was to establish the county of Washington, covering all that portion of the territory which lay east of the Scioto and Cuyahoga rivers. Courts of Common Pleas and Quarter Sessions were formed, with proper judges and officers for each, and for the county. The Court of Common Pleas was opened with great ceremony on the 2d of September, Colonel Eben- ezer Sproat, the sheriff, six feet and four inches in height, marching with drawn sword and wand of office at the head of the judges, governor, and
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secretary, preceded by a military escort and a number of Indians, to the blockhouse of the Campus Martius, where the temple of justice was first opened in Ohio. On the 9th the judge of the Quarter Sessions, also, was installed. There being no case on the docket of either court, the tribunals were formally adjourned.
St. Clair promptly turned his attention to the treaty for conciliating the Indians. He had al- ready taken measures at Pittsburgh for an early council with them on the Upper Muskingum. This was frustrated by an attack of some vagrant Ottawas and Chippewas upon the military, who were guarding the ground and supplies for the occasion. It was therefore deferred until Decem- ber. At that time he received, and for some weeks entertained, a concourse of Indians, who, as it afterwards turned out, had no authority from their nations, not a chief or warrior of any note being among them. Brandt and others were con- fidently expected as delegates from the Six Na- tions, but turned aside on their way ; the wily chief being engaged in a double game, with both sides, British and American. In explanation of this approach and sudden drawing off, there was a popular romance of the time that Brandt aspired to the hand of Louisa St. Clair, the governor’s elder daughter, a famous rider and an excellent shot. It was even credited that the feeling was reciprocated, and that the fearless maiden often rode to the trysting in the woods, far from the
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fort. But it was mere romance. In a speech by Brandt, in 1794, he explained his conduct by stat- ing that Governor St. Clair, as he had discovered, would not listen to proposals for observing the Ohio River as the boundary ; he therefore would not meet him.
St. Clair’s object was to obtain from the Sene- cas and other tribes on the Ohio the ratification of a boundary supposed to have been gained by cessions of the Mingoes at Fort McIntosh, and of the Shawanees at Fort Finney. He had no diffi- culty with the rabble assembled at Fort Harrnar. As Brandt anticipated, St. Clair showed more of the soldier than the peace commissioner in an- swering their claim of the Ohio. It had been given up at the late treaties, he told them, by their brethren. By taking sides with England they, as well as their great ally, had forfeited all title. But if they wanted war they should have it. This kind of logic admitted of no further parley. The Indians signed the treaties as dic- tated to them, and in the language of Major Denny, a witness, “ this was the last of the farce.” Unhappily it was not the last of the delusion.
The governor had, in the meanwhile, united with the judges in their arduous office as legisla- tors ; as arduous, perhaps, as ever was imposed upon a legislative board. For a country so im- mense and a people so scattered, their statutes must be such as, virtually, would execute therm selves. Very appropriately the first law passed
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was “ an act to establish and regulate the militia, published at Marietta on the 25th day of July, 1788.” A division arose between the governor and the two judges as to some of its provisions, and the question was raised whether the gover- nor, though outvoted, might not exercise his veto power. The governor objected, also, that it was a new law, whereas they only had the power to adopt such laws as were established in some State. The governor on this occasion yielded, and would have been fortunate had he oftener been as moderate. Congress, however, disap- proved the opinion of the judges that, in cases of necessity, they might issue new laws.
Ten chapters of territorial laws were published in the course of the year, but as there was neither press nor printer in the territory, they were is- sued in writing, certified by the governor and judges, and circulated by copies, some of which are extant yet. Those which were issued prior to January 1, 1792, were collected and printed that year at Philadelphia. A second volume of the laws published between July and December, 1792, was printed at Philadelphia in 1794. In 1796 a third volume was printed by William Maxwell at Cincinnati, and hence styled “ the Maxwell Code,” probably the first book printed in the Northwest Territory. The fourth and last volume, of the laws of the governor and judges was printed at Cincinnati in 1798, by Edward Freeman. The laws subsequently enacted by the
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territorial assembly made three additional vol- umes.
While the governor and judges were engaged in their lawmaking, they were joined by Judge Symmes, who arrived at Marietta August 27,
1788, bringing a little fleet of boats, conveying his own and other families of immigrants, destined for his embryo city of Miami, near to Fort Fin- ney and the mouth of the Big Miami. He re- mained only three days to unite with his col- leagues in the laws for establishing the territorial and county courts, being under an engagement to meet Denman, Patterson, and Filson the next month at the founding of their town opposite the mouth of the Licking River.
The succession of the territorial judges, until the admission of Ohio into the Union, was in the following order : Judge Varnum, died in January,
1789. All offices becoming vacant on the accession of the new government under the Constitution, the governor, secretary, and Judges Parsons and Symmes were reappointed, and George Turner in the place of Varnum, in August, 1789. Judge Parsons was drowned in November, while at- tempting to shoot the rapids of Beaver River in a canoe. Rufus Putnam was appointed in his place, but resigned in December, 1796, on being promoted to the office of surveyor general, Jo- seph Gilman being named to succeed him. Judge Turner had various difficulties, and resigned. Re- turn Jonathan Meigs, Jr., was appointed to fill
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the vacancy, and he, with Judges Symmes and Gilman, constituted the court until the State of Ohio was established.
Governor St. Clair proclaimed Christmas to his people as Thanksgiving day. Having con- cluded his Indian treaty and set his territory going as far as practicable, he repaired to the city of New York, and with others of Washing- ton’s generals joined in the inauguration of their beloved chief as President, in April, 1789. Dur- ing the entire session of Congress, which contin- ued until October, he was attending upon its com- mittees and the cabinet, aiding and advising in the legislation necessary to adapt the provisions of the Ordinance of 1787 to the new govern- ment. Amendatory laws were made which ena- bled the secretary to act as governor in case of a vacancy or absence. The governor was empow- ered to call the militia of the states into service, when necessary to protect the frontier settlers. Laws were passed to confirm the French and Canadians, or other settlers, in lands lawfully acquired under the former governments. Full deliberations were had also as to the policy to be pursued by the government in relation to the Indians, a subject much complicated by the un- friendly attitude of the British cabinet and the weak state of the federal finances. Full instruc- tions were given to St. Clair. General Washing- ton added a letter of personal injunction that war with the Indians was to be avoided by every
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means consistent with the security of the frontier people and the honor of the country. To this end St. Clair was instructed to ascertain at once, and inform him, whether the Indians of the Wa- bash and Illinois were for war or peace, and the cause of their hostility. If they were implacable and continued their warfare, St. Clair was au- thorized to call out fifteen hundred of the Vir- ginia and Pennsylvania militia, either offensively or defensively, as he and Colonel Harmar should determine. He was instructed, also, to carry out the measures directed by Congress for settling land claims on the Wabash and Mississippi.
On this mission Governor St. Clair returned to Marietta, and, after disposing of affairs there, embarked for the Mississippi. He stopped Janu- ary 2, 1790, at Fort Washington, erected during the previous autumn at the new town (Losanti- ville) opposite the Licking River. Here the gov- ernor spent three days, and met Judge Symmes. On the 4th he established the county of Hamilton, extending from the Ohio River north, between the two Miamis, to a line drawn from “ the Standing Stone Forks” (or branch) of the Big Miami due east to the Little Miami. Losanti- ville now disappeared, being declared by the governor, by virtue of his office, the county seat, by the name of Cincinnati.
Doubtless this was with the assent of Ludlow and the proprietors, but on St. Clair’s part it was a heartfelt tribute to the patriot society in
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which Washington and his officers signalized their devotion to the noble example of the old Roman. The name given to the county was a tribute, also, to the distinguished soldier and statesman who was next to Washington in the heart of St. Clair.
Passing on to the West, he and the secretary were busily occupied the next six months. In settling the disputed titles, St. Clair’s accomplish- ment in the French language gave him great ad- vantage, as also in explaining the bearing of the anti-slavery clause in the Ordinance, which these people violently denounced. St. Clair defended the clause, and succeeded in allaying their fears by assuring them that it had no retroactive ef- fect. Numbers, notwithstanding, removed across the Mississippi, where the Spaniards promised them immunity from all trouble on that score.
At the same time he was managing through Major Hamtramck, the commandant at Vin- cennes, an able and most efficient officer, to sound the Indians on the Wabash and Maumee, accord- ing to the instructions of the President. A speech of the governor to the tribes, communicating Washington’s strong desire of peace, and urging them to come and meet him, was sent out by a trusty messenger. Along with his amicable proffers of peace he unfortunately introduced the phrase used at Fort Harmar, “ accept it, or re- ject it, as you please.” This the fiery warriors on the Wabash regarded as a defiance, and drove the messenger back.
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Recourse was had to Antoine Gamelin, a French trader, whose long intercourse, honest dealing, good heart, and perfect bonhommie had given him universal popularity among the tribes. Much as they liked him, and always avowing their faith in him, the Indians passed him on from tribe to tribe, with no answer to the speech or invitation until he arrived on the Maumee. Here the chiefs were outspoken. “ The Ameri- cans,” they said, “ send us nothing but speeches, and no two are alike. They intend to deceive us. Detroit was the place where the fire was lighted ; there is where it ought first to be put out. The English commander is our father since he threw down our French father; we can do nothing without his approbation.”
Gamelin returned hopeless, and Hamtramck, in transmitting his report to the governor, added that since Gamelin’s return, traders who had ar- rived brought information that war parties, more numerous than ever, were going to the Ohio. No doubt the new fort, erected between the Miamis, had excited fresh exasperation, and the blow fell with terrible fatality upon the emigrants, who, in false security, were descending the Ohio in large numbers. The ambuscades were never more savage than in the spring of 1790. One party of fifty-four Shawanees and Cherokees, from the Pickaway villages, posted themselves on the north bank of the Ohio, about six miles above the Scioto, in March, and by means of a captured
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boat and a decoy of white prisoners created such havoc among the passing boats that all Kentucky was alarmed.
Dropping his business on the Mississippi, St. Clair hastened to Fort Washington, where he met Harmar, July 11, now promoted to the rank of brigadier-general. They concerted an imme- diate campaign by two expeditions, to march, September 15, against the Miamis, at the head of the Maumee River. One, commanded by Ham- tramck, was to move up the Wabash ; the other, and larger force, under General Harmar, was to assemble at Fort Washington and march directly north in concert with the other wing. For this purpose fifteen hundred militia were required of the county lieutenants of Virginia (Kentucky) and Pennsylvania, to report and concentrate with Harmar’s regular troops at Fort Washington.
The governor’s personal diligence and zeal in preparing the expedition will be seen by a mere reference to his itinerary. General Harmar re- mained at Fort Washington to organize his force.. St. Clair made a flying visit to Kentucky, and thence to Pittsburgh, hastening the levies. From there he went to New York to report to the Presi- dent the failure of his effort with the Indians, and the necessity of the expedition, and to aid the War Office in forwarding the necessary arms and supplies. All this was accomplished in two months, so that on September 23d he was back at Fort Washington to see the expedition started.
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There was not force sufficient for the intended movement up the Wabash, but on the 26th Gen- eral Harmar, with fourteen hundred and fifty- three troops and six pieces of artillery, three hun- dred and twenty of the troops being regulars, and four companies of the militia mounted, set out on the campaign. This resulted in failure, though by no means defeat.
The Miamis fled as Harmar approached, and their towns at the head of the Maumee were destroyed. This was all that General Knox had ordered, and according to Indian warfare was a success. But the militia colonels were bent upon a fight, and Harmar unwisely yielded. They were defeated, and lost so heavily in two ambus- cades, that, though he brought his little army back in good order, the disaster and the discords which broke out between the officers of the regu- lars and the insubordinate militia inflicted a stigma upon Harmar’s reputation, especially in Kentucky, which was fatal to him, though highly unjust.
Another campaign was called for. Congress responded by adding another regiment to the regular army, and authorizing another draft for fifteen hundred militia. But it was limited to six months’ men, and the command, owing to the aversion of the Kentuckians to Harmar, was given to Governor St. Clair. For this purpose he was appointed a major-general, and General Richard Butler of Pennsylvania a brigadier, and second
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in command, early in 1791. Most ominous, how- ever, were the appointments of Colonel William Duer as chief commissary and contractor, and Samuel Hodgdon, another satellite of the public offices, as chief quartermaster. Colonel Duer’s only appearance in the campaign was at the Treas- ury, where, as Knox, the Secretary of War, wrote to St. Clair, he was in attendance in March, and drew $70,000, as reported by a committee of Congress.
The dismal details of this campaign need not be recited. Its object was to repair the mistake of General Knox in the Harmar expedition, by establishing a strong military post at the head of the Maumee ; and to give full time for this, St. Clair was to have marched from Fort Washington on the 10th of July. But General Butler, who superintended the recruiting and forwarding of the new troops, and Hodgdon, upon whom the equipments and outfit mainly depended, did not arrive at Fort Washington until the 7th of Sep- tember. Duer did not appear at all. St. Clair, amid these perplexities, was so much harassed and goaded by urgent orders from Knox to go for- ward, that on the 17th he moved out, as Harmar forewarned him, to almost certain disaster. An- other month was lost in building forts Hamilton and Jefferson (the latter six miles south of Green- ville). The time of the six months’ men began to expire, and, for want of a commissary, the army was nearly out of bread. St. Clair was sick, and
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so crippled by gout that he could not mount his horse without help, but, with a resolution worthy of success, pushed on. On the 27th of October a body of his mutinous militia deserted and went back, threatening to help themselves to provisions by plundering the trains in the rear, improvised by St. Clair. Colonel Hamtramck, with the first regiment of regulars, St. Clair’s best troops, was sent in pursuit.
Little Turtle, Harmar’s antagonist, who was hovering near with a thousand and fifty warriors, now saw his opportunity. On November 3d, late in the evening, St. Clair encamped in the woods, on the banks of a stream which, as he had no guide, he did not know was the Wabash. In the night he was encircled by his foe. At dawn on the 4th, they rushed upon his advanced camp of militia, scattering them like chaff, and then stormed his main camp on all sides. After a hopeless and desperate fight of four hours, eight hundred men (eight hundred and ninety-four, it was said) lay dead within a space of ten acres. The other half fled in confusion.
The horrors of this defeat cannot be depicted, nor the consternation with which the survivors filled the country. On the banks of the Ohio it was felt, literally, that
“ The childe may rue that is unborne ;
The pity, it was the more.’’
There is a plaintive ballad of the time which
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long hung on the walls of the log cabins, and serves not only to show the popular grief, but as a specimen of the primitive literature of the West.1
But now, as often happens, it was “darkest just before day.” The savages, in their exultation over these repeated triumphs and spoils, little dreamed that the hour and the man were at hand to settle their doom. Congress again arose to the emergency. The regular army was increased to five thousand men, and means provided for ample supplies. There was a minority, however, who protested that the frontier was not worth the sac- rifice of blood and treasure it was costing.
To appease this feeling, Washington resorted again to measures for peace-making. Various embassies were sent out in the summer of 1792. General Rufus Putnam, assisted by the missionary Hecke welder, had a friendly reception on the Wa- bash. But Colonel Hardin, who was sent to the northwest, and Major Trueman, to Sandusky, with flags of truce, were assassinated. Fifty chiefs of the Six Nations were invited down to Philadel- phia to engage them to make a conciliation with the western confederacy. Brandt received the most obsequious attention, as he had at London, also. The great council of the confederacy held their meeting about the 1st of October, at Grand Glaize (Defiance), and were induced by Brandt and the delegates of the Six Nations to agree 1 See Appendix, No. 3.
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they would meet the President’s commissioners at the Rapids, “next year when the leaves opened but with a distinct notification that no boundary but the Ohio would be admitted.
For this commission Benjamin Lincoln, Beverly Randolph, and Timothy Pickering were appointed in March, 1793. But Washington, acting upon the vote of Congress, had prepared a year before for the other alternative. In place of St. Clair, he had appointed Anthony Wayne major-general of the army, — a soldier whose impetuous valor, near akin to madness, never failed in any emer- gency, and whose prestige soon restored hope to the panic-stricken West. He would not accept upon the terms which St. Clair had borne. It was a singular coincidence that he avoided St. Clair’s mistakes at the Maumee, as well as at Ticonderoga. He would have no six months’ men. He required two years for organizing, drilling, and hardening his men, before they took the field. He had special conferences with Washington in rela- tion to the Indian methods of fighting, to deter- mine the tactics for counteracting their desultory, Parthian ways, both in battle, camping, and marching. The result was the formation of the “ Legion,” a body which, fully completed in its four sub-legions, required five thousand infantry, artillery, and cavalry compacted as one body, and convertible, by quick and simple movements, into line or square, to meet attack on any side. His recruiting officers were instructed to enlist none
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but Americans, and special drill in the use of the bayonet and broadsword was enjoined. Stony Point, it will be remembered, had been stormed with unloaded muskets.
During the summer twenty-five hundred men were enlisted and organized at Pittsburgh into companies of horse, foot, and artillery. During the next winter they occupied a temporary en- campment at Legionville, twenty miles below Pittsburgh, where they were put through more extended evolutions and drill. In April, 1793, they descended the Ohio to Cincinnati, where the infantry and artillery went into camp at u Hob- son’s choice.” The four companies of cavalry (sorrels, grays, chestnuts, and bays) were sent over to a camp in Kentucky, dubbed by the young troopers with the resounding name of Belleriphon- tia, where bushwhacking and charging througli the woods and broken grounds on the Licking was practiced all the summer.
The converse of all this was taking place on the Maumee. The commissioners had set out in May to meet the Indian council. But their mis- sion was five years too late. The savages had not only become elated, but were rich in spoils taken from Harmar and St. Clair. To reach them the commissioners were under the necessity of accept- ing the British Governor Simcoe’s hospitalities at Navy Hall (Niagara), and there waiting, for weeks, for the British vessel which was to convey them up the lake. In J uly, Brandt and fifty delegates
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from the council appeared there, to inquire whether they had authority to establish a boundary, and to say that the appearances at Fort Washington were warlike. Satisfactory assurances were given on both points; a special express being sent to the President, to repress any hostile measures by General Wayne while the treaty was going on.
The commissioners were then taken to the De- troit River, and lodged at the spacious residence of Elliott, the assistant of McKee, the chief mis- chief-makers of the British governors, who were then in council with the Indians. Here another deputation came for a more definite answer, whether the commissioners had authority to fix the boundary line at the Ohio River, as estab- lished between the Indians and white people in 1768, at Fort Stanwix. The answer to this very categorical demand, probably drawn by Mr. Pick- ering, was an elaborate review of the whole sub- ject, most able and convincing to white men, but utterly hollow and hopeless to the Indians. The deputies promised an answer the next day, and it was neither peaceful nor flattering. The commis- sioners were told to go home. Elliott, when the words were interpreted, said they were wrong. Simon Girty, the interpreter, insisted he had given them truly. After explanations they were withdrawn, and the commissioners requested to wait until the council should be consulted.
Twelve days elapsed, during which reports were brought of stormy debates, and that all the nations
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but the Shawanees, Wyandots, Miamis, and Dela- wares (the Ohio tribes) were for peace. But on the 16th came the answer, signed by sixteen na- tions, adhering to their position, and concluding thus : “ Brothers, we shall believe you mean to do us justice if you agree that the Ohio shall remain the boundary between us. This is the great point which we hoped would have been explained be- fore you left your homes, as our message last fall was principally directed to obtain that informa- tion.”
This was the ultimatum defiantly thrown down by the united confederate tribes ; the alliance, it will be remembered, which La Salle and Tonti had set in motion, a hundred and ten years pre- viously, to repel the Iroquois, who now were vainly pleading with them to relinquish the terri- tory then so fiercely asserted by the Iroquois to be theirs. The commissioners retired, and sent expresses at once to warn General Wayne, as well as the President, of their failure.
Whatever doubt there might else have been as to the complicity of the British government with the Indians in demanding this boundary, Governor Simcoe threw off all disguise by proceeding, in April, 1794, as if in anticipation of Wayne’s ad- vance, to erect a fort (Miami) at the rapids of the Maumee, at which three companies of the 24th British Infantry formed the garrison. There was strong reason for believing that at this time there was a purpose in the British cabinet to
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take back the country northwest of the Ohio, to counterbalance the alleged wrongs of the loyalists and British creditors under the treaty of 1783. Lord Dorchester (Guy Carleton), in a speech to the Indians at Quebec, February 10, 1794, told them that the United States had broken the treaty, and he should not be surprised if Great Britain and the United States were at war that year. “ If so, a line must be drawn by the war- riors.”
General Wayne, on hearing from the commis- sioners, was deeply impressed with the danger overhanging the frontier, and he took pains that his men should feel it also. They caught his spirit and were eager for the fray. In September, he marched out with the Legion, two thousand six hundred strong, to a point six miles in advance of Fort Jefferson, where he halted, ostensibly for his wagon trains, and for the coming up of a thousand mounted Kentuckians, but in fact for a strategy not divulged. He established at this point a strongly fortified camp (Greenville), and his real design in halting was to assume a menac- ing position, and before delivering his blow, school his men to the woods and swamps. In this they were constantly exercised. The Kentucky mounted men were kept in equally active prac- tice, guarding the supply trains against the daring attacks between the forts by the Indians. An- other of Wayne’s vigilant precautions, neglected by St. Clair, was the employment of the most
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expert men on the frontier as spies and scouts or rangers ; the latter, about forty in number, under Captain Ephraim Kibby, being on foot, the spies mounted. The spies were a band of six or seven of the most daring border men, some of them brought up among the Indians, and all thoroughly versed in Indian wiles, as well as the Indian language. By their feats and hairbreadth es- capes they became the very paladins of early Ohio romance, as may be seen in the pages of McBride and McDonald. McClellan is also im- mortalized in Washington Irving’s “ Astoria.” Be- sides scouring the front with these spies and rangers, General Wayne’s pioneers were cutting roads in various directions to blind the Indians as to the route by which he meant to advance ; so that it was in doubt to the last whether it would be to the head of the Maumee, to the Rapids, or the middle course down the Auglaize. From this tortuous circling the Indians gave him the name of the Black Snake, but after the battle changed it to the Big Wind (tornado).
The winter and spring thus wore away. In December, however, General Wayne had thrown up a strong stockade fort (Recovery) on St. Clair’s battle-ground, with a garrison under Cap- tain Gibson. In June, 1794, as General Wayne did not move, Little Turtle assaulted this fort with a large force of Indians, accompanied, as Wayne believed, by British officers. After two days’ struggle they were driven off, with a loss so
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heavy that the Indians long deplored it as their worst defeat.
On the 28th of July the Legion and two bri- gades of mounted men from Kentucky, under General Scott, marched northwest to Fort Re- covery, thence turning back to Girty’s town, on the St. Mary’s, where a stockade fort (Adams) was thrown up in a day. Here Wayne’s plan, which was to march down the Auglaize, was be- trayed by a deputy quartermaster (Newman), who deserted to the Indians. As to this affair there is an unsolved mystery. It caused a breach between Wayne and Wilkinson, his second in command, which, but for the death of the former, would have become serious. Newman was sub- sequently captured and put in irons, but released. Some clue to this may be found in an earnest entreaty by the Delawares, at the treaty of Green- ville, that Wayne would spare his life.
During a halt of six days at Grand Glaize, Fort Defiance was built, and a flag of truce sent to the Indians, who were concentrated at the Rapids, with an appeal from Wayne that “ they should be no longer deceived or led astray by the false promises of bad men, nor shut their ears to this last overture for peace.” But that this might afford no pretext for dallying, he crossed the Maumee the next day, and going forward met his flag returning with a shuffling answer. Just be- low the Rapids, on the morning of August 20, he encountered the Indian lines, extended nearly
ST. CLAIR AND THE INDIAN WAR. 255
two miles from the bank of the river, behind thickets of trees prostrated by a tornado, so that the engagement which followed was called the battle of the “ Fallen Timbers ; ” the British fort being about a mile in their rear. His front line of militia received a hot fire and fell back. The charge was then sounded. The second and third lines (the Legion) advanced ; the dragoons on the right penetrating the fastness by a narrow pas- sage at the river, and turning, sword in hand, upon the Indian flank. The front line of the Legion broke through the brushwood, the Indians took to flight before the second line, or the mounted men on the left, came up, and in an hour were driven more than two miles. The gates of the fort were mercilessly shut against them, and they scattered to the woods. The devastation of houses and farms on both sides of the Maumee was kept up for two days, McKee’s residence being destroyed among others. Some countermarching close to the fort was also ex- ecuted, to impress Major Campbell with the danger of his position, but judiciously, perhaps, for both sides, he resented it no further than by a note to Wayne, protesting against the indignity offered to his flag.
So in an hour the pride and power of the In- dian confederacy and the scheme of re-annexing the Northwest Territory to the British dominions were broken. It was every way opportune that Mr. Jay, at this time, was negotiating with the
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English Ministry for the treaty of 1795. This victory secured the surrender of Detroit, the fort on the Maumee, and all other posts or dependen- cies within the boundary of 1783.
General Wayne returned to Greenville; first erecting Fort Wayne at the head of the Maumee. Here he left a strong garrison under the com- mand of Colonel Hamtramck; another also at Fort Defiance ; thus severing the connection of the Ohio tribes with those of the Northwest, and the dependence of either upon Detroit.
Simcoe, Brandt, and McKee, it was discovered, were soon at work again stirring up war by every art that was possible, either through bribery or threats. The administrative genius of Wayne was now as signally shown in detecting and foil- ing their plots as in his military measures. The Wyandots were terribly sick. They had lost twelve out of thirteen of their chiefs who were in the late battle. Tarhe (the Crane), the surviv- ing chief at Sandusky, in their - isolation saw no hope for them in any more risings. Secretly, through him, General Wayne discovered the new plot, and found means of offering peace to the confederate tribes, if they would accept the boun- dary proposed in the treaty of Fort Harmar. One by one they acquiesced, and on the 10th of June, 1795, a grand council of delegates from the various nations, headed by chiefs and warriors who never before had met in amity with Ameri- cans, gathered at Greenville to treat with Wayne,
ST. CLAIR AND THE INDIAN WAR. 257
now appointed commissioner plenipotentiary of the United States for the occasion.
Little Turtle was at first silent, but listened with close attention to whatever General Wayne said. Evidently there was discord or jealousy be- tween some of the chiefs. At length he opened his grounds of hostility in a speech of senten- tious force and eloquence on behalf of the Mi- amis. He was answered by Wayne bravely and generously, and his points were so skillfully un- folded and turned against him as to carry the as- sembly. Bukongehelas and Blue Jacket, the Shawanees war chiefs, who also had stood off, joined with the majority ; Little Turtle was him- self convinced; and on the 3d of August, 1795, without a dissent, the treaty of Greenville was signed by Wayne, and ninety chiefs and delegates of twelve tribes.
Perpetual peace and amity were declared. The tribes abjured all other influence and placed themselves under the protection of the United States. All prisoners on both sides were re- stored. In consideration of $20,000 in gifts paid down, and annuities of $9,500 forever, to be paid to these tribes in certain proportions, they yielded to the United States their right to all the territory south and east of the line, then fixed, and ever afterwards known as the Indian boundary. It was not the same, however, as the Fort Harmar line. Like that, it passed up the Cuyahoga and across the Tuscarawas portage to the forks of the
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Tuscarawas, near Fort Laurens (Bolivar), and then south of west to Loramie’s store ; but there, instead of turning north to the Maumee, it bore west by north to Fort Recovery, and thence turned southwestwardly to the Ohio River, opposite to the mouth of the Kentucky, or Cuttawa River. The territory north and west of this boundary was expressly relinquished to the Indians by the United States, except a number of specific tracts which they ceded. The most extensive of these were the posts of Detroit and Mackinac, and all lands in the vicinity of each, which the Indians had granted to the French or English. The cession at the British fort, near the rapids of the Maumee, was twelve miles square, besides another six miles square at the mouth of the river. There were cessions six miles square also at Loramie’s, Fort Defiance, Fort Wayne, and on Sandusky “ lake,” and one of two miles square at the lower rapids of the Sandusky River.
The treaty was a triumph equal to the battle. It was the first great assemblage of the Indian na- tions face to face in council with the “ Thirteen Fires” ; and when Wayne in his opening speech held up to them the national emblem of the eagle, and pointed to the arrows clutched in the one talon, and then to the olive branch held forth in the other, the effect was highly impressive. The dignity and heroic manner with which he conducted the proceedings throughout were wor- thy of the great interests at stake. Many of the
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war chiefs, as already suggested, had come to the council sore and haughty, but after a short inter- course with Wayne, these stern warriors could not repress a magnetic response to the grip of the hand, and the soldierly frankness and sympathy which he showed them. This strong personal regard so grew upon them that at parting with General Wayne they assured him that they now understood the treaty, and were so fully con- vinced that it was wisely and benevolently calcu- lated to promote their interest, that it was their determined purpose to adhere to it. None of the great chiefs or warriors who signed it took up arms afterwards against the United States.
A passage or two from the speeches of Little Turtle may be quoted. As showing the insig- nificance of the preceding treaties, this extract from his first utterance is material. Addressing General Wayne, he said : —
“ You have shown, and we have seen, your powers to treat with us. I came here for the purpose of hearing from you. We have heard and considered what you have said. I suppose it to be your wish that peace should take place throughout thd world. When we hear you say so we will be prepared to answer you. You have told me that the present treaty should be founded upon that of the Muskingum. I beg leave to observe to you that that treaty was effected altogether by the Six Nations, who seduced some of our young men to attend it, together with a few Chippewas, Wy- andots, Ottawas, Delawares, and Pattawatomies. I beg
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leave to tell you that I (the Miamis) am entirely igno- rant of what was done at that treaty.”
In another speech he gave his celebrated out- line of the extent of the country of the Mia- mis : —
“ General Wayne, you have pointed out to us the boundary line between the Indians and the United States, but I now take the liberty to inform you that that line cuts off from the Indians a large portion of country which has been enjoyed by my forefathers time immemorial, without molestation or dispute. The prints of my ancestors’ houses are everywhere to be seen in this portion. I was a little astonished at hear- ing you, and my brothers, who are now present, telling each other what business you had transacted together heretofore at Muskingum concerning this country. It is well known by all my brothers present that my fore- father kindled the first fire at Detroit ; from thence he extended his lines to the headwaters of the Scioto ; from thence to its mouth ; from thence down the Ohio to the mouth of the Wabash, and from thence to Chi- cago, or Lake Michigan ; at this place I (the Miamis) first saw my elder brothers, the Shawanees. I have now informed you of the boundaries of the Miami na- tion, where the Great Spirit placed my forefather a long time ago, and charged him not to sell or part with his lands, but to preserve them for his posterity. This charge has been handed down to me. I was much sur- prised to hear my other brothers differed so much from me on this subject ; for their conduct would lead one to suppose that the Great Spirit and their forefathers had not given them the same charge that was given to me,
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but on the contrary had directed them to sell their lands to any white man who wore a hat, as soon as he should ask it. Now, elder brother, your younger broth- ers, the Miamis, have pointed out to you their coun- try”
The battle at the rapids of the Maumee opened the land for the Ordinance of 1787. Measured by the forces engaged it was not a great one, nor was that which had been fought on the heights of Quebec. But estimated by the difficulties overcome, and the consequences which followed, both were momentous. To the bold spirit of Pitt, Earl of Chatham, it is due presum- ably that the people of the Mississippi valley are not to-day Canadian French. Next in honor with the people of the Northwest, as among their found- ers, might well be placed the lion-hearted An- thony Wayne, who opened the “ glorious gates of the Ohio ” to the tide of civilization, so long shut off from its hills and valleys.
CHAPTER X.
OHIO BECOMES A STATE.
As the settlers’ guide to the Northwest, the Ordinance of 1787 has been compared to the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night. It might be added that it was by General Wayne, and the treaty of Greenville, that they were brought into the promised land. Till then, the Indians never for a moment relaxed their hold upon the Ohio, so solemnly pledged to them at Fort Stan- wix by the king, with the acquiescence of the com- missioners of Pennsylvania and Virginia. And never after that treaty, to their honor be it re- membered, did the Indian nations violate the limits which it established. It was a grand trib- ute to General Wayne that no chief or warrior who gave him the hand at Greenville ever again “ lifted the hatchet” against the United States. There were malcontents on the Wabash and Lake Michigan, who took sides with Tecumseh and the Prophet in the war of 1812, perhaps for good cause, but the tribes and their chiefs sat still.
It was a year or more before the Western people could believe there was peace. But Indians com-
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263
ing across the line to hunt and trade, as the treaty- allowed, assured them of it. uThe siren song of peace and agriculture,” in the figure of a Ken- tucky historian, was heard through the land. Plowmen and church-goers no longer carried their rifles. Surveyors might now camp by the fire, and sleep without hiding away from it, a lux- ury unknown to hunters and trappers aforetime. The vocation of the ranger and scout was gone. After twenty years of this daring life of border warfare, these men, generally poor and little used to farming or traffic, beyond the mere bartering of their peltries, were now to drop into insig- nificance, or disappear among the newcomers, with their dexterous arts of land-speculating and money-getting. Many of them, however, served with the surveyors and land locators, who now be- came the important middlemen, and plied the compass and chain in every quarter. Putnam be- came the surveyor-general, and under his adminis- tration nearly all the tract known as the Military Bounty lands was laid out. On the Miami there were Ludlow, Cooper, Schenck, and Galloway ; on the Scioto, Massie and McArthur were chief. Their name was legion, and when they took the stand in courts as witnesses, they spoke xas the oracles. As seen by the map, more than half of Ohio below the Indian line and east of the Cuya- hoga was now opened to emigrants and land sales. In the years 1796-8 a wave of population, farmers, mechanics, traders, clergy, physicians, and lawyers
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began to pour in upon the Territory. Emigrants were now made independent of the land jobbers, because at the government sales each could se- lect and purchase his section for himself, at first hand.
A range of towns thus emerged across the coun- try north of the early settlements, showing where the new population gravitated. Earliest were Dayton and Chillicothe, both laid out in 1796. The former had been projected the year before, by Generals Wilkinson, Dayton, and St. Clair, with Israel Ludlow, but settlement was stopped, as in other cases, by the failure of Symmes to complete his title, though the town had actually been laid out.
Through Daniel C. Cooper, who had been em- ployed in their surveys, and had obtained pre- emption rights under the compromise granted by Congress, the families and settlers from Cincin- nati, who were in the enterprise, succeeded in securing their foothold, retaining the name of the town in compliment to General Dayton.
Earlier in the year Massie had led a party from his town on the Ohio to the u Station Prairie,” on the Scioto, above the mouth of Paint Creek. On this rich and prolific bottom they ploughed and planted three hundred acres in corn. The proprietor and his surveyors at the same time laid out the town of Chillicothe, just above, stretching across the beautiful valley curving be- tween the Scioto and Paint Creek. The word
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seems to have signified in the Indian tongue a town, and there were several of that name. By its position on the west bank of the Scioto, at the heart of the Virginia military district, this soon became the nucleus of the Virginians, who chiefly held the lands. Its influence upon the affairs of the Territory will be seen.
Chillicothe, like Dayton, had been projected a year earlier. A number of respectable people of the counties of Mason and Bourbon, in Kentucky, were disposed to remove, from their dislike of negro slavery. Among these were the Rev. Robert W. Finley, Captain Petty, and James Manary. While moving under an arrangement with Gen- eral Massie (who afterwards acquired this title), a party of sixty, in crossing the country from Limestone to the Scioto, in the spring of 1795* encountered an Indian encampment on Paint Creek. The Indians were attacked, and fled. The whites fell back, but early the next morn- ing were attacked in turn. They repulsed the Indians and returned to Kentucky.
Ordinarily this would have passed without no- tice. It happened, however, that General Wayne just at the time was anxiously drawing together the great assemblage at Greenville, and the In- dians were startled by a suspicion of treachery. Wayne wrote in great indignation to Governor St. Clair, reflecting somewhat upon his government, and was very caustic upon “ Parson Finley ” and Massie. The worst of it was that this band, sixty
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or seventy Shawanees under Pucksekaw, one of the chiefs, started on a raid to the Ohio and Western Virginia. Wayne succeeded in pacify- ing the Shawanees at Greenville, and they sent Blue Jacket in pursuit. Pucksekaw and the ma- rauders were brought back, in great contrition. The chief’s apology to Wayne was that he had been in the woods some months, and was wholly unacquainted with the good work going on at Greenville ; but he insisted that his camp at the Scioto had been robbed when they were peaceably hunting.
This was the last of the Indian war in Ohio. The last reported buffalo was killed on the Hock- hocking in the same year. On the 24th of Oc- tober, the first public sale of lands by the gov- ernment was made at Pittsburgh. These were in the seven ranges, the surveys of the military lands, extending across the middle of Ohio from the seven ranges to the Scioto, not being yet com- pleted. Notwithstanding the attractive offers of land now opened in the Miami purchase and Virginia district, the sales in the seven ranges at Pittsburgh and New York footed up 200,806 acres. This indicates the activity with which “ movers ” were setting towards the Ohio.
The important event of the year was the evac- uation of the posts, and final surrender by Eng- land of Michigan and the Maumee and Sandusky valleys. By the Jay treaty, this should have occurred on the 1st of June, but the furious com
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test over the treaty in Congress delayed it, though the British authorities and officers were ready to comply. Colonel Hamtramck and the United States troops entered Detroit July 11th, and northwestern Ohio for the first time came under the flag. General Wayne transferred his headquarters there in the next month. Governor St. Clair being absent from the Territory, Colonel Sargent met General Wayne, as vice-governor. The county of Wayne, with appropriate courts and officers, was established, embracing Michigan and all northwestern Ohio, and all proper meas- ures were taken for indoctrinating the French in their new institutions. For a while the effort had a serio-comic character, but gradually the habitant acquired all the style and arts of accomplished republicans.
Governor St. Clair, in 1795, had written to the secretary, “ There is not a road in the country.” It would seem that the numerous military expedi- tions must have left broad tracks between Cincin- nati and Mad River on one route, and out to the Maumee on others. The earliest, perhaps, of “internal improvements” by the United States was the road for the mail route from Wheeling to Limestone. For this and the necessary ferries the President was authorized by Congress in May, 1796, to enter into contract with Ebenezer Zane, of Wheeling. His compensation was to be three sections of land on the route: one at the Muskin- gum, one at the “ Standing Rock ” on the Hock-
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hocking, and one opposite Chillicothe on the Scioto. This road, known as “ Zane’s trace,” was committed by him to his brother Jonathan and his son-in-law John Mclntire, and consisted at first of a bridle path, cut through the woods and winding around the stumps. In a few years cor- duroy bridges (saplings laid crosswise) were put in at marshy places. The stately road wagon then followed, with its teams of four and six horses, tinkling bells mounted on their collars, the connecting link for inland commerce between the packhorse and railway car. After this came the mail stage ; this road, for forty years, being the great mail route between Washington and Kentucky.
At the Muskingum, Zane and Mclntire estab- lished Zanesville in 1799, and New Lancaster in 1800, at the Hockhocking. This town owed its name to the thrifty emigrants from the old Penn- sylvania County, who first settled Fairfield. Many of the same stock founded the agricultural coun- ties eastward of Fairfield. Their broad mark of well tilled farms is to be seen all across the mid- dle of Ohio, reaching to the rich valley of the Miamis.
The government of the Territory received a new accession, in 1797, from the appointment of Cap- tain William Henry Harrison as secretary, Colo- nel Sargent being appointed governor of Missis- sippi Territory. Captain Harrison had been left in command of Fort Washington by General
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Wayne, and now resigned his commission in the army. During this year, also, the counties of Adams and Jefferson, and in the next year the county of Ross, were established by the governor.
A census of the Territory, taken in 1798, estab- lished the fact that there was a population of five thousand free white male inhabitants, of full age. It was entitled, therefore, to enter upon the second stage of government prescribed in the Ordinance. An election of representatives by counties was ordered by the governor’s proclamation and writ, in the proportion of one for every five hun- dred of the population. This census is not acces- sible, but we may estimate what it was by the number of representatives allotted. Washington County (the Muskingum) had two ; Hamilton (the Miamis), seven ; Ross (the Scioto), four ; Adams (Virginia military district), two; Jefferson (Upper Ohio), one ; Wayne (Detroit), three ; St. Clair and Randolph (Illinois), and Knox (Indi- ana), each of them one. New Connecticut, as the Western Reserve was styled by St. Clair, had no delegate, and at this time he knew but one man in the district.
A meeting of the representatives elect at Cin- cinnati, February 4, 1799, nominated ten persons, from whom five were appointed by the President to compose the legislative council. These were Jacob Burnet and James Findlay of Hamilton County, Robert Oliver of Washington, David Vance of Jefferson, and Henry Vanderburgh of
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Knox. The assembly, consisting of the governor and the two bodies thus chosen, was convened at Cincinnati, September 23. This transfer of the seat of government to Cincinnati was made by the governor, without any formal law on the subject. He had also adopted a territorial seal, which sub- sequently aroused some controversy. The device was apparently a buckeye-tree, as the antiquarians contended ; the foreground being another tree, felled and cut into logs. The motto, Meliorem lapsa locavit , signified literally he “ planted one better than the fallen.” The device, it was in- sisted, clearly explained why the appellation of Buckeyes and the Buckeye State had been given to Ohio and her people. Cynics, however, who despised the buckeye, regarded the motto as proof that it must be an apple-tree.
This first assembly of the Territory is an object of interest as the beginning of a great fruitage. Though an improvisation, and containing many men unacquainted with the forms or technical re- quirements of legislation, its members were the strongest and best men of the Territory, thor- oughly awake to its condition and wants. What was singular in the political agitation then raging at the east, party division and influence here were scarcely perceptible. Several members were men of a high order of talent, and became eminent in the councils of the nation and state. Jacob Burnet of the council was a lawyer of learning and ability, the chief adviser and sup-
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port of the territorial administration, and after- wards a judge of the supreme court of Ohio, and senator of the United States. His “ Notes of the Northwest ” is an invaluable historical legacy, without which St. Clair’s administration and the early settlement of Ohio would hardly be intelli- gible. Among the representatives were McMil- lan and Fearing, able lawyers, who afterwards represented the Territory in Congress ; Tiffin, Worthington, and Smith, who became senators in Congress, the two former governors of Ohio also ; and Massie and Sibley, leaders in forming the states of Ohio and Michigan.
Governor St. Clair met the council and repre- sentatives in joint assembly on the 25th. The ceremonial equalled an opening of Parliament. His speech was a clear statement of the condition of the Territory, and of the objects which would demand their attention. Separate responses were made by the two bodies, couched in the most appropriate form and phrase. To each of these the governor replied with equal felicity. The assembly devoted themselves for three months to the matters brought before them, but as these were chiefly of temporary concern they need not be recalled. William Henry Harrison was sent as delegate to Congress. It is quite noteworthy, in reference to Mr. Jefferson’s anti-slavery proposi- tion, that on the fourth day of the session a com- mittee, to which a petition of officers of the Vir- ginia line for “ toleration to bring their slaves
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into the Virginia Military District,” had been re- ferred, brought in a report that it would be in- compatible with the Ordinance, and it was unan- imously adopted. Notwithstanding this decisive action, another petition was received from Thomas Posey, and other officers and soldiers of the Vir- ginia line, urging that persons from states in which they require that species of property might be permitted to bring their slaves into the Ter- ritory with them, under certain restrictions. But the assembly was inexorable. Bills were passed, also, by which some of the counties were divided and new counties created.
At the conclusion of the session, December 19th, they were again met by the governor, and “ pro- rogued ” until the next year, with the same for- mality as at the opening. But he reserved until this occasion the announcement that he disap- proved of eight or ten of their bills. Among them were those relating to new counties. As to these, besides other reasons for the veto, they were very plainly told that this was the proper business of the executive, and not theirs. The ambiguity in the Ordinance, upon which this turned, has been pointed out. These measures, therefore, were shelved for a year, and some of the members went home sorely aggrieved. So many persons, in and out of the assembly, were engaged in laying out towns for county seats, that the disappointment excited great rankling. General Massie was doubly defeated, as he had
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previously attempted to steal a march on the governor by applying to the Court of Common Pleas to remove the county seat of Adams to his town of Manchester.
But all acrimony was hushed for a time in the universal grief at the death of Washington, which occurred at the close of the year and of the cen- tury. To no one was it more afflicting than Governor St. Clair. At Cincinnati the event was observed by most solemn funeral honors. The “Western Spy” of February 5th describes the scene as one never before witnessed by the people. A funeral procession of the military companies of the town and the garrison moved from the fort, followed by the officiating clergyman, pall-bearers supporting a bier and coffin ; a horse, representing that of the deceased hero, with saddle, holsters, and boots reversed ; Governor St. Clair and the attorney general as mourners ; the Masonic brethren, militia officers in uniform, and citizens. The cortege moved through the streets to the burial-ground, where the coffin was formally interred with prayer, Masonic ceremonies, and musketry. This extraordinary memorial was fin- ished with a short but most impressive address by the governor.
The contention which soon ensued went far deeper than the question as to new counties, or the arbitrary use of the veto. It resulted in a discord which was fatal to Governor St. Clair. The charges and counter-charges of the parties
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to the quarrel are disclosed in part by Judge Burnet. The more closely the dispute is exam- ined, the more nearly will the responsibility, if not the origin of it, be traced to St. Clair.
He was ardently devoted to General Washing- ton, and to his administration and successor. So, in fact, were most of the leading men in the Territory. The old army influence was strong. St. Clair made no disguise of his attachment to the Federal party, as the one most identified with the Constitution and the Union. He gloried, therefore, in being a Federalist as contradistin- guished from those who still pinned their political faith to the Articles of Confederation, and the new tenets and vocabulary of French democracy. Withal, he retained most friendly and social rela- tions with the leading men of this opposition. But his confidence and chief correspondence were with those who supported the administration, and to this cause he regarded himself as in duty bound to guide the administration of the North- west Territory. One with whom he constantly counseled was James Ross, the distinguished sena- tor of his own state, by whom, it is just to say, the interests of the Northwest were always cherished.
In a letter to this gentleman, soon after the assembly had adjourned, St. Clair wrote that he had been “ obliged to put a negative upon a good many of their acts, but that the session had passed off harmoniously, and their last act had been a very handsome address to the President ”
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(Adams). After alluding to matters which might come before Congress, he recalls a subject on which they had already conferred, of dividing the Territory into districts and erecting two gov- ernments. As to the expense, which Mr. Ross had suggested as an objection, St. Clair argued it was nothing compared with the inconveniences of its becoming a state, “ and if it is not divided,” he said, “it must become a state very soon.” Taking Kentucky as an example, he pointed out the evils which would result. “ All this might be prevented by the division of the Territory.” To answer the purpose, however, the division must be such as to u keep them in a colonial state for a good many years.” In a letter to the Secretary of State (Pickering), which he said he had just sent, he had indicated the proper boundaries, but now, on reflection, thought it would not answer. For while it would make the eastern state surely Federal, “ its population was so thin that the de- sign would be evident.” He therefore suggested a line drawn north from the mouth of Eagle Creek (Brown County) as better, as the western district, if divided by the Big Miami, must return to the first stage. The people of Ross County desired the line of the Big Miami, and he believed that Colonel Worthington had gone to Philadel- phia for that object. They looked to a new state, and as almost all were Democrats they ex- pected to have the power and influence.
In a subsequent letter to Harrison, February
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17, 1800, urging the division as “ a thing on which I have thought a great deal, and have fervently wished,” he asserted that “ the most eligible division is by the Scioto, and a line drawn north from its forks. The eastern division would then have its seat of government at Marietta. Cincin- nati would thus continue to be the seat of gov- ernment of the middle district, and Vincennes become that of the western.”
These are the earliest disclosures of a design to divide the Territory, and, as will be seen, were subversive of the plan fixed in the Ordinance. Why Colonel Worthington had gone to Philadel- phia, and whether the people of Ross County were yet awake to the huge design thus imputed to them, might appear if Worthington’s papers were not lost. The notion that he was applying to a Congress and President of Federalists to establish a democratic state, wears an air of ideal- ity and romance of which he was not suspected. St. Clair’s letter to Pickering had been seen by Harrison, and made known. This and the other causes of variance excited an intense animosity against the governor, particularly in Ross and Adams counties, in which the Virginia influence prevailed, and at which St. Clair’s scheme was chiefly aimed.
Very soon, and in a manner almost accidental, the question as to a division was brought into Congress. After a stubborn conflict between Harrison and his supporters in the House, and
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the friends of St. Clair in the Senate, an act was passed in May, 1800, dividing the Territory, by the Greenville treaty line, from the Ohio np to Fort Recovery, and thence directly north through Michigan. All eastward of this boundary contin- ued to be the Northwest Territory. The country westward was established as the Indiana Terri- tory, but in all other respects was governed by the Ordinance. The act emphasized, as though it were the point of conflict, that this should in no wise be construed to affect the original provision in the Ordinance that the line due north from the Big Miami River should remain permanently fixed as the western boundary of the eastern state, whenever erected. A further provision that Chillicothe and Vincennes should be the seats of government of the respective districts, until otherwise ordered by the legislature of each, aroused a vehement outcry of St. Clair’s friends, especially at Cincinnati, as being an infringement upon the legislative authority vested by the Or- dinance in the assembly. This was but one of the shifts to which the governor’s party were driven. If Congress might divide the Territory, it was no great stretch of the law to change the seat of government ; and the less so as it had never been fixed by law, nor otherwise than at the governor’s pleasure.
At the opening of the next session of the as- sembly at Chillicothe, November 5, the embit- tered relations of the governor and the opposing
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party were painfully exposed by the terms of his speech. His term of office, he said in con- cluding, was soon to expire, and it was uncertain if he should meet another assembly, as he well knew that the vilest calumnies and grossest false- hoods were assiduously circulated. Notwith- standing the baseness and malevolence of the au- thors, he could conscientiously declare that no man could labor for the good of the people of the Territory more assiduously than he had. No act of his administration had had any other motive than to promote their welfare and happiness. This was assuming the whole point, and did little to allay the malcontents. In answering the speech, the council mingled their compliments to the governor with strong indignation at his traducers. The representatives were not so effu- sive.
A joint committee was appointed by the two bodies to address a gentle remonstrance to his Excellency as to the exclusive authority which he asserted of establishing new counties. It was intimated that the assembly found no reason to change their views. It was also suggested that bills not approved might be returned before the session was closed, so that objections might be obviated. But the governor remained headstrong on the county question, and treated the other suggestion with some disdain. It seemed to re- gard his action, he said, somewhat in the light of a mere qualified dissent, whereas by the Ordinance
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he was a third branch of the assembly, and his negative as absolute as theirs. But if they should see proper to apply to Congress for a change of the law, he would cheerfully unite in it. This was so much like cavilling as to add to the dis- affection. To make matters worse, the governor suddenly put an end to the session on November 9, when the legislature was in the midst of its business. The ground ostensibly was, that, as his term of office expired that day, the assembly could not proceed, the law not authorizing the secretary, in this emergency, to act as vice-gov- ernor. The true reason, as alleged, was that the secretary (Charles W. Byrd) was suspected of being in sympathy with the opposition. A biog- rapher of St. Clair describes this as “ an evidence of political sagacity and courage.” Judge Burnet, though a strong partisan, admits that “St. Clair’s best friends were apprehensive that the motive of excluding the secretary had an improper influence on his mind.” It was certainly unfortunate, as he was soon renominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate.
Under an important amendment, which Cap- tain Harrison procured during his short service in Congress for the sale of the military bounty lands in half sections, the influx of population grew larger than ever. This law also admitted of sales upon credit, but in this respect was less fortunate. Harrison exerted himself also to se- cure the relief at this time granted to the people
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who had lost their titles by the failure of his father-in-law, Judge Symmes. By another act of grace, in the same year, the holders of the Connecticut title for the Western Reserve lands were brought out of tribulation. The general want of confidence in the title was retarding the growth of the country. Though Congress had been tender with Connecticut, as with all the state pretensions of title to the western lands, it was felt that the United States might at any time assert a paramount right. At the time that Congress was dealing so liberally with the sufferers in the Miami purchase, a law to provide for “quieting the title of persons claiming as grantees or purchasers, under the State of Connecticut, the tract commonly called the Western Reserve,” authorized the President to execute a patent to the governor of Connecti- cut for their use and benefit, provided that state should within eight months renounce forever all claims of territory and jurisdiction westward of the east line of the state of New York, saving the claim thus quieted. Connecticut, through Gover- nor Trumbull, executed the renunciation May 30, 1800, and the President, by patent, conferred the title of the United States upon all lands in the Western Reserve. Thus the belt of one degree and five minutes in width, along the forty-first parallel clear to the “ South Sea,” forever had rest.
Governor St. Clair on the 10th of July very
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appropriately established the entire Reserve as a county, under the name of Trumbull. In De- cember he established the counties of Clermont and Fairfield, and in September, 1801, Belmont, thus completing the nine counties which formed the basis of the State of Ohio. The military bounty lands between the Reserve and the north line of the Seven Ranges and of the Ohio Com- pany’s purchase, stretching across from Pennsyl- vania to the Scioto, brought in a large immigra- tion of Pennsylvania Germans. A strong ele- ment of the Scotch-Irish, from the same quarter, also entered this middle belt, and was gradually diffused through the state.
The third assembly, or properly the first ses- sion of the second assembly, met at Chillicothe November 25th, and with it came the turning point in the struggle of St. Clair and the Federal- ists to set aside the plan of the Ordinance for new states. The assembly was favorable to the governor, notwithstanding the partial disaffec- tion. The council remained as it was, except that Solomon Sibley of Detroit had been ap- pointed to succeed Vanderburgh, transferred to Indiana. A few changes had occurred among the representatives, chiefly among the members from new counties. Jeremiah Morrow and Francis Dunlevy, from Hamilton County, were the most conspicuous. But notwithstanding the total over- throw of the Federalists in the late elections of President and Congress, the people of the North-
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west Territory seem in the main to have been unmoved. A considerable majority of the rep- resentatives in the new assembly were either of that party, or so well inclined to the governor as to be practically the same.
The assembly met just as the first session of Congress, under Mr. Jefferson’s administration, was commencing its session, and in view of its composition, as all was quiet in the Territory, the policy of Governor St. Clair and his friends should have been to keep it so. An unusual amount of interesting business was in hand. Cin- cinnati, Chillicothe, and Detroit were incorpo- rated. The “American Western University ” at Athens was established. Important instructions to Mr. Fearing, the delegate in Congress, were on foot. All at once the affairs of the Territory were brought to a crisis by two measures. One was a bill declaring the assent of the Territory to a change in the boundaries of the states to be formed under the Ordinance of 1787 ; the other, to remove the seat of government and fix it at Cincinnati. In the first of these bills the divi- sion established by the Ordinance was declared to be “inconvenient and injurious, as the eastern state (Ohio) in particular would be too exten- sive for the purposes of internal government.” It was proposed, therefore, that the eastern state should be bounded east by Pennsylvania, and west by the Scioto River up to the Indian boun- dary, and thence by a line drawn to the west
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corner of the Connecticut Reserve, and with it to the lake ; the middle state to extend along the Ohio from the Scioto to the falls of the Ohio, and its western boundary to be a line from there to the Chicago River ; the western state to occupy the country between that line and the Missis- sippi.
This bill was introduced into the council by Mr. Burnet on the 3d of December, and passed unanimously the same day. In the other chamber it met a determined resistance, but was passed by a vote of twelve representatives against eight. The bill transferring the seat of government to Cincinnati was passed with some change of votes, but by the same majority. Both were approved by the governor, and a transcript of the former was immediately transmitted by him to Mr. Fear- ing, to be presented to Congress.
The indignation at Chillieothe resulted in a disgraceful mob, which under the leadership of Baldwin, a popular demagogue and most intem- perate enemy of the governor, attempted to force their way into his lodgings, but were driven off by the bravery of Major Scheiffelein, a member from Detroit, and others who came to the rescue. That the insult had no countenance from the opponents of the governor in the assembly is made plain by his own statement, twice repeated, that “ Baldwin was not prevented from it but by the splendid exertion of Mr. Worthington, who was obliged to go so far as to threaten him with
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death.” Worthington was the most earnest and strenuous, perhaps, of the governor’s opponents.
This movement to disturb the plan of the Or- dinance and restrict the eastern state to the nar- row limits between the Scioto and the Pennsyl- vania line, was so manifestly a blunder as well as wrong, that it produced a revulsion of feeling fatal to Governor St. Clair. He denied any cog- nizance of the bill prior to its introduction, but unquestionably it bears the marks of his letters two years before. Among the charges presented to the President, when his removal was sought, it was alleged that “ the late effort to alter the bounds of the states in the Territory originated with the governor, and has been supported by his influence in all stages.” Justly or unjustly, he was held responsible for it, and never recovered from the storm of obloquy which now fell upon him. The minority in the House of Assem- bly entered a protest on the journal. Meetings to remonstrate were held. A committee of correspondence was established. Printed peti- tions and remonstrances to Congress against the change were sent broadcast through the Ter- ritory for signatures. Worthington was dis- patched to Washington with credentials from his colleagues, and Baldwin sent with him by the citizens’ committee, to oppose the act passed by the assembly, which Mr. Fearing on the 20th of January, 1802, had presented to Congress.
Judge Burnet’s comments on this rupture are
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the shortest and least communicative in his “Notes.” “ The friends of the change admitted,” he said, “ that it would retard the establishment of a new state, an object of great weight with Mr. Jefferson’s party. His close election, in the late contest with Burr, made the vote of another state desirable. But the assembly argued that the de- lay would have beneficial tendencies.” What these were to be, may in part be inferred from St. Clair’s letters to Ross and Pickering. But the opposition had not been slow in detecting that the object was to continue the colonial period, for party purposes, to the general detriment. Those in Ross and Adams counties also saw that, while the new plan might be very well for Marietta and Cincinnati, it placed the Scioto and Chillicothe on the outer edge of both districts. Both parties were alike, perhaps, in their motives, but at this day no one doubts which was right, on the merits. It is manifest that the state bounded by the Scioto would have been a stupendous blunder. The op- ponents of such a measure had little difficulty in scoring a double victory, first with Congress and then with the popular vote.
Worthington quickly discovered at Washington that the assembly would not only be overruled, but that the majority in Congress would go further, if the Territory was ready. His coadjutors and the committee at Chillicothe were u pleased to hear of our assuming an independent form of government, and requested and instructed him to exert his
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influence with Congress to effect so desirable an event ; an event which, terminating the influence of tyranny, will meliorate the circumstances of thousands by freeing them from the domination of a despotic chief.” Worthington was instructed to effect the calling of a convention, and submit it entirely to Congress to direct the time, place, and purposes. This was the sort of spirit which St. Clair, unhappily for himself, had raised in the Territory.
The House of Representatives in Congress, by a vote of eighty-one against five, rejected the act of the assembly, evidence enough how offensive it was. Dr. Cutler, singularly, was one of the five for marring the Ordinance. Under the lead of Mr. Jefferson’s next friends, Messrs. Brecken- ridge in the Senate and Giles in the House, an Act of Congress, April 30, 1802, authorized a con- vention of delegates to be elected in September by the votes of that part of the Northwest Territory bounded east by Pennsylvania, south by the Ohio River, west by a line drawn from the mouth of the Big Miami River due north to an east and west line passing through the south extremity of Lake Michigan, and by this line and the Canada line through Lake Erie to the west line of Pennsylva- nia. This, it will be seen, omitted Michigan ; and as the Federalists were the majority in Michigan, it was denounced as a political fraud. But the Ordinance plainly contemplated it.
The convention was required to meet Novem-
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ber 1st at Chillicothe, and thereupon determine, first, whether it was expedient to establish a state government. If decided by a majority to be ex- pedient, the convention was authorized to proceed in adopting a constitution and forming a state government, or it might call another convention for that purpose. This constitution and form of government were to be republican, and in con- formity with the compact of 1787, and the state, until the next census, was to have one representa- tive in Congress.
A condition of peculiar form was annexed. If the convention would provide, in a manner irrevo- cable except by the consent of Congress, that all public lands in the new state should be exempt from all tax for five years after they should be sold, Congress offered to give it section sixteen in every township for schools ; also all the reserva- tions of salt springs ; and, besides all this, one twentieth of the net proceeds of all sales of public lands in the state, to be applied by Congress in making roads between tide- water and the Ohio River and in the state.
There was a vigorous contest, and some bitter- ness, between the parties in the Territory, at the election of delegates ; the issue being state or no state. The enabling act was denounced as a viola- tion of the Ordinance. The exclusion of Michigan was assailed, especially, as unconstitutional and oppressive. The exemption of the public lands from tax was derided as a humiliating condition,
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and an insult to the equality professed to be held out. These were the points made by the opposi- tion. How idle they were appears by the Ordi- nance, which provided against every one of the objections.
The result of the election was that St. Clair’s policy was strongly resented by the people of the Territory. When the convention assembled and the question was put, thirty-four out of the thirty- five members voted to proceed at once to form a constitution and state government; the sole vote in the negative being that of Ephraim Cutler of Marietta. Fourteen, however, opposed a motion that “ Arthur St. Clair, Esq., be permitted to ad- dress the convention on those points he deems proper.” The speech was another unhappy mis- take, for it inveighed against the Act of Congress before men who had been moving heaven and earth to bring it about. It was denounced as “ an interference by Congress in the internal af- fairs of the country, such as they had neither the power nor the right to make, not binding on the people, and in truth a nullity.” With much more of this contemptuous language, the conven- tion was called upon to set Congress at defiance.
The address was deemed “ sensible and concili- ating” by Judge Burnet. The President, to St. Clair’s misfortune, took a different view of it, and on the 22d dismissed him from office “ for the dis- organizing spirit, and tendency of very evil exam- ple, grossly violating the rules of conduct enjoined
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by his public station, as displayed in his address to the convention.”
So ended the public career of Arthur St. Clair. The rest of his life was embittered by an unre- lenting persecution, which, not satisfied with his humiliation, reduced him to stark poverty by denying him any compensation for money which he had advanced for the public service in its ut- most need.
The ingratitude shown by the country was most unjust. Granting St. Clair’s faults, granting that he erred grievously as to his powers, and in the attempt which he made to break the arrangement for new states so wisely drawn in the Ordinance, and that on some occasions he was obstinate in withstanding reason and argument, all this was, as he himself confessed, due to error of temper and judgment, and never to a corrupt or dishonor- able purpose. He sinned like thousands of men to-day, who take office without being equal to the duties involved, but he was not an unprincipled tyrant, as his enemies habitually represented. He believed conscientiously that he was serving the interests of the country. By his military train- ing he had acquired the high spirit which British officers at that period carried to a fault, so that in civil affairs in the backwoods his manner seemed imperious and arrogant. Underneath he bore a gentle, generous, and brave heart. His fidelity and devotion to Washington in all the dark in- trigues and perils of the Revolution proved it.
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But with the pertinacity of his race, which clings to its opinions, he unfortunately cherished a conceit that he was learned in the law. Before committing the mistake which lost him his office, he had on one occasion withstood an opinion of the attorney-general. There was a misconcep- tion on the part of St. Clair and his friends as to the authority of Congress. It was not so well settled then as now, that its jurisdiction over the territories is supreme, as supreme as that of a state over its counties, if not more so.
On the 29th of November the constitution was adopted by the unanimous vote of the convention, and this by the enabling act was final, and did not require a reference to the popular vote. In presence of the popular manifestations, both be- fore and after this vote, it is idle to contend that the people of the Territory were averse to it. Worthington was appointed an agent of the state, with instructions to return to Washington and secure the measures necessary for consummating the work which he and his colleagues had so suc- cessfully begun.
The instrument so adopted, it would be respect- ful to pass in silence. It was framed by men of little experience in matters of state, and under circumstances unfavorable to much forecast. With such a model of simplicity and strength before them as the national constitution, which had just been formed, the wonder is that some of its ideas were not borrowed. It seems to have been
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studiously disregarded ; and Ohio, as well as some states further westward, which her emigrant sons with filial regard induced to adopt her example, has suffered ever since from a weak form of gov- ernment made up in haste, and apparently in mortal dread of Governor St. Clair. He declined to be a candidate for the office of governor, but unluckily not until the convention had adjourned. In after-years Ohio’s greatest and wittiest gov- ernor was wont to say, that, after passing the first week of his administration with nothing to do, he had taken an inquest of the office, and found that reprieving criminals and appointing notaries were the sole “ flowers of the prerogative.”
Briefly stated, it was a government which had no executive, a half-starved, short-lived judiciary, and a lop-sided legislature. This department, overloaded with the appointing power which had been taken away from the executive, became so much depraved in the traffic of offices, that, in an assembly where there was a tie vote between the Democrats and the Whigs, two “Free Soilers” held the balance of power, and were permitted to choose a United States senator, in consideration of giving their votes, for every other appoint- ment, to the party which aided them in this su- preme exploit of jobbery. A new constitution put an end to this, but the shadow of St. Clair still predominates.
One occurrence in the convention deserves no- tice. In the terms for the qualification of voters,
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US at first adopted, the right of suffrage had been conferred upon negroes and mulattoes. But on a revision, a motion to strike this out was carried only by the casting vote of the president, — a strange prelude to the rigorous u black laws” soon afterwards adopted by the legislature.
The effect of the enabling act was that the peo- ple of Ohio, by the adoption of the constitution, became a body politic. But being without a gov- ernment they were not yet a state, nor were ’they yet accepted or admitted into the Union. This the new constitution itself recognized. It acknowl- edged expressly that the territorial government should continue until the new government should be formed. For this purpose it was ordained that an election of the governor, members of the legis- lature, sheriffs and coroners, under the constitu- tion, should be held January 11, 1803, and that the legislature should commence its first session on the 1st of March at Chillicothe, as the capital.
At Washington, the speaker, on December 23, laid before the House of Representatives a letter of Thomas Worthington, as “ agent of the conven- tion of the State of Ohio,” communicating for the approval of Congress the constitution, and the consent of the convention, with certain amendments, to the condition which Congress had proposed, which papers were referred to a special committee. Before they reported, a ques- tion was raised whether Mr. Fearing was any longer entitled to his seat as delegate for the
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Territory. On the 31st of January the House de- cided that he still held his place. Two days af- terwards resolutions were reported by the special committee, consenting to certain additional dona- tions proposed by the convention. This was for- mulated in a bill, and passed by an Act of Con- gress, March 3, 1803.
The Senate also had taken up the subject by a bill introduced January 5, to “ provide for giving effect to the laws of the United States within the State of Ohio.” A communication was presented from Worthington on the 7th, as agent, enclosing a copy of the state constitution. A committee was directed to report what legislative measures, if any, were necessary for admitting the State of Ohio into the Union, and extending the laws of the United States over the state. The bill re- ported by this committee, after reciting that a constitution and state government had been formed by the people pursuant to the enabling act passed by Congress, and that they had given it the name of the State of Ohio, ordained that it be established as a judicial district of the United States ; that a district court be organized, and hold its term on the first Monday in June, at Chillicothe ; and that the laws of the United States should be of the same force and effect in the said state as elsewhere in the United States. This bill was passed by Congress February 19.
Here, then, were two acts of Congress recog- nizing the State of Ohio, but no state yet estab-
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lished which could accept or act upon them ; and the constitution expressly recognizing the territo- rial government as in force until the state govern- ment should be established. The elections were held January 11th. The first general assembly met at Chillicothe on the 1st of March. Upon or- ganizing and canvassing the votes for governor, Edward Tiffin was declared to be elected. In the course of the session Return Jonathan Meigs, Jr., Samuel Huntington, and William Sprigg were appointed judges of the Supreme Court. Thomas Worthington and John Smith were chosen as senators to Congress, and an act passed for hold- ing an election of a representative to Congress, on June 11th. Jeremiah Morrow was elected. But Congress had adjourned on the 3d of March, and the senators and representatives of Ohio were not actually admitted until the next session.
As there was no formal act of admission by Congress, much dispute has arisen as to the time when Ohio was admitted as one of the United States, the various hypotheses ranging all along from the date of the enabling act, April 30, 1802, to the actual seating of her senators and repre- sentatives in Congress, October 17, 1803. It is quite clear that the enabling act did not form the state. It is also certain that the inchoate state which was framed by the convention was post- poned, by its express submission to the territorial government, until the state government could be formed and set in operation. The earliest day at
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which this can be said to have occurred was at the meeting of the legislature on the first day of March. The law-making power being the reposi- tory and paramount representative of the power and sovereignty of the state, the territorial gov- ernment on that day ceased, and Ohio became a state in the Union.
This was the view of the question subsequently adopted by Congress. In March, 1804, Judge Meigs, for himself and his associates of the terri- torial court, presented a petition stating that they had continued to exercise their duties until April 15, 1803, and had applied at the Treasury for pay- ment of their salaries accordingly. The account- ing officers, on the advice of the attorney-general, had refused to allow it beyond November 29,
1802, the day on which the state constitution and form of government had been adopted. The judges had thereupon applied to the legislature of Ohio, and they likewise refused, holding it to be an obligation of the United States.
After reports by two committees, and a warm debate and close division in committee of the whole, an act was passed February 21, 1806, di- recting the salaries of the Territorial officers to be allowed and paid at the Treasury until March 1,
1803. This therefore may be deemed an author- itative decision of the subject.
CHAPTER XI.
THE PIONEERS.
The next thirty years of Ohio life may be summarized as the long struggle of the pioneers with the forest and bad roads ; they were literally getting out of the woods. The first migration of the traders and hunters was past. The murder- ous foes of Logan, Cornstalk, and the Moravians had disappeared. The early settlers who followed them had, by a sudden revolution, set up a state and begun a new order of things. Then came an immigration, attracted not only by rich land and love of adventure, but by the strong prestige which the free state, built upon the Ordinance of 1787, had at once acquired. The immigrants were not merely admirers of free commonwealths in the abstract, but numbers of them were men from Kentucky, Virginia, and states further south, who brought their slaves with them for emancipation. A reaction followed upon this movement. The masters, with the best intention, had unwisely set the freedmen adrift in a wild, uncultivated country, without fitness or capacity to provide for themselves. Bad results followed, and harsh legislation was resorted to as a check.
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Laws were passed, not only to restrain the settle- ment of negroes, but to expel them. Among other measures, they were made incompetent as witnesses in any suit, criminal or civil, where a white person was a party. Violent outbreaks occurred in which expulsion, under these laws, was cruelly enforced.
The times were every way hard. The straits to which the forefathers of the state were re- duced, in public as well as in private life, are to be seen in the pictures of their first capitol at Chillicothe, of hewn logs, two stories in height, with an imposing front of thirty-six feet on Sec- ond Street, and twenty-four feet on Walnut. Its grand feature was fifteen glass windows, each of twelve panes, eight by ten inches in size, a degree of splendor thought to be unequalled in the terri- tory until eclipsed by the Blennerhassets. Here sat the territorial assemblies in St. Clair’s time. Its successor, erected by Ross County in 1801 to accommodate the assembly and the courts, far surpassed it. This probably was the first public edifice built of stone northwest of the Ohio. It was about sixty feet square, surmounted by a bel- fry and lightning-rod, upon which the American eagle, with widespread wings, long did duty as a weathercock. Here the convention which formed the Constitution of 1802, and the state legislature, for many years held their sessions.
The millions who are dwelling in peace and plenty in the broad farms and busy towns of
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Ohio to-day, can get no realizing sense, from mere words, of the hardships by which their prosperity was earned. The toilsome journey, the steep mountain ways, the camping-out where there were no inns and hardly a road to guide them, were as nothing to the dreariness which, at the journey’s end, confronted the immigrant and his devoted wife and tender children. The unbroken forest was all that welcomed them, and the awful stillness of night had no refrain but the howl of the wolf or wailing of the whippoorwill. The nearest neighbor often was miles away.
Their first necessity was to girdle the trees and grub a few acres for a corn crop and truck patch, sufficient for a season. As soon as the logs were cut a cabin was built, with the aid of neighbors. Necessity invented the “ house-raising,” as it did the log-rolling and corn-shucking. This habita- tion, with its clapboard roof, its single room, and door, if any, swinging upon wooden hinges, with no window but a patch of greased newspaper be- tween the logs, and no floor but the ground, was often finished at nightfall on the spot where the trees had stood in the morning. The daubing of the chinks and wooden chimney with clay, and a few pegs in the interior for the housewife’s dra- peries, were all that the Eastlake of those days could add to the primitive log cabin.
But food, rather than shelter, was the severest want of the pioneers. True, the woods were full of game, but venison, turkey, and bear-meat all
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the time became tiresome enough. There was no bread nor salt. The scanty salt-springs were therefore precious. The Indian corn, when once started, was the chief reliance for man and beast. The modern Ohioan may know of hominy, but the art of making hoe-cake, ash-cake, johnny-cake, the dodger, or a pone, is lost. This crop, convert- ible also into bacon, pork, and whiskey, soon be- came the staple of the country. The want of mills at first led to singular devices. Corn was parched and ground by hand or by horse-power. At Marietta an ingenious application of power was obtained by bracing a mill-wheel between two boats anchored in the current of the Muskin- gum,— a powerful mill-race without a dam.
The furniture of the cabins and the dress of the people necessarily partook of the same absolutely rustic simplicity. Excellent tables, cupboards, and benches were made of the poplar and beech woods. The buckeye furnished not only bowls and platters for all who had no tin or queensware, but also the split-bottom chair still in popular use. Bearskins were bed and bedding. The deerskin, dressed and undressed, was very much used for clothing, and the skins of the raccoon and rabbit formed a favorite head-gear. But wool and flax soon abounded, and spinning- wheels and looms became standard articles in every house. The home-made tow-linen and woolens, or mixed flannels, linseys and jeans, con- stituted the chief materials for clothing. For
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dyestuffs the hulls of the walnut and butternut and a root of bright yellow first answered, but were superseded by indigo and madder, which became almost uniformly the colors of the hunt- ing-shirt and the warmus. These primitive fash- ions gradually yielded as store goods, together with iron and Onondaga salt, began to be intro- duced, by the great Pennsylvania wagons, from Pittsburgh and the ports along the Ohio River. After the purchase of Louisiana considerable im- ports came from New Orleans by keel-boats.
The pioneers had pastimes and festivities also in their own way. Besides such gatherings as those already mentioned, there were the sugar- camp, the militia musters, the bear hunts, the shooting matches, and the quarter race. At these the neighborhood for miles around was wont to gather. The quilting party also was a thing of joy in feminine circles. Here the housewife made a gala day for her friends by collecting them round her frame to put together one of those decorative works, a pile of which, to the pioneer mother, was esteemed of more honor than all the shawls of her modern granddaughter. A wedding, among people of the better sort, was a three days’ festivity. The gathering on the first day included a variety of the sports above mentioned, according to taste and circumstances. Next came the nuptials, the invariable dance, and the feast. The infare closed the third day with an escort of the bride to her new home, and the
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ride was not unlike that to Canterbury in style. The house-warming ended with another dance, in which there was no modern stiffness or dawdle.
Camp-meetings were another early custom, ori- ginally adopted to supply the want of Sunday worship. The country store, also, was an impor- tant centre, especially when the county seats were distant. There was little money, and busi- ness was chiefly in barter for peltries, ginseng, beeswax, and such products as could be trans- ported by packhorses. Cut money, or “ sharp shins,” was a curious necessity of the times. For want of small change, the coins, chiefly Spanish, were cut into quarters, and so circulated. By a law of the governor and judges, in 1792, it was enacted that, as the dollar varied in the several counties of the Territory, all officers might de- mand and take their fees in Indian corn, at the rate of one cent per quart, instead of specie, at their option. In trading, the deerskin passed readily for a dollar. The bearskin brought more, and the peltries variously less. Beaver were rare, and soon became extinct.
A curiosity of later date, when roads and wheeled vehicles became practicable, was the traveling museum. It consisted of three, four, or more box-cars, mounted on low wheels, and lighted by windows in the top. These, on arriving at the show-places, were united, end to end, so as to form an interior gallery, through which the admiring spectators passed to enjoy the sights. Shelves
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and glass cases were filled with objects of every description, from the bones of the mastodon down to Dr. Franklin’s veritable penny whistle. Panoramas of colored engravings were exhibited through magnifying-glasses, and the whole world was brought before the eye by the pulling of a string. The grand attraction was the gallery of wax figures, among which the most captivating were the Sleeping Beauty, Daniel Lambert, Washington on his deathbed, and perhaps the actors in the latest atrocious murder, all in one mingled scene.
Schools were an object of the very earliest in- terest to the settlers of Ohio. The first school was not the free school, however, for which Con- gress had set apart the munificent foundation of one thirty-sixth part of all the lands in the state. This was to wait until the gift should be ripe for the purpose. Pride and ignorance, moreover, were bitterly opposed to the free system. Schools were sustained for twenty-five years by the par- ents of the pupils, and though of divers sorts, were by no means inefficient. Hardly a township or village was without one. Generally they were of humble architecture, but had*good teachers. The mixture of studies would be regarded now as het- erogeneous. Discipline was of the most rigorous type. “ Toeing the mark ” was the test of deco- rum. At the teacher’s desk there was commonly a straight line drawn or cut on the floor, to which every one of the class reciting was bound to stand
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erect under direful penalties if neglectful. The pupils were trained also to umake their manners,” and in those days always gave a bow or curtsy to the passing traveler on the road. Many of the men who taught these schools were of superior education, and the names of some are kept in grateful memory. One of them deserves more than a passing mention. This was Francis Glass, who about the year 1820 kept a school for the farmers’ children in a remote part of Warren County. In the midst of this drudgery he con- ceived and wrote the life of General Washington in Latin, a volume of two hundred and twenty- three pages. After his death it was published by his friend, Prof. J. N. Reynolds, with the approval of Charles Anthon, Drs. S. B. Wylie, Wilbur Fiske, and other classical scholars, as not only a literary curiosity, but, to use Dr. Anthon’s words, for its easy flow of style, and the graceful turn of very many of its periods.
Another phase of the times is given by Judge Burnet in his Reminiscences, where he speaks of the long journeys made by the judges and law- yers on horseback through wilderness and swamps across the Indian country, in the annual rounds of the courts. They traversed distances of sixty or eighty miles in these circuits without seeing the habitation of a white man, carrying blankets and supplies for their bivouacs, often made in swamps where the roots of the trees afforded the only bed. The Indians entertained them always
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with hospitality. Old Buckongehelas on one occasion made up a grand ball gan^e on the St. Mary’s for their diversion. Riding the circuit in company long continued to be the custom of the judges and the bar, the lawyers residing in only a few of the larger towns. If the traditions be credited, the old court-houses and the wayside must have echoed with a wonderful mingling of law and hilarity. Hammond, Ewing, Corwin, and Hamer all began their practice in this school.
It was not many years before these primeval conditions began to wear away. In the more fer- tile and accessible counties the farms and houses, with their grounds and blooming orchards, their well-filled barns and herds of cattle, horse, and swine, gave a new aspect to the country. Man- sions of greater proportions and elegance were to be seen here and there, with interiors furnished with mahogany, mirrors, and all the fittings of life in the older states. The advance in the ways of polished society was a grief to McDonald, the biographer of the pioneers, who “ well remembers it was in Mrs. Massie’s parlor he first saw tea handed around for supper, which he then thought foolish business, and remained of that opinion still.” The earliest of these stylish mansions was that of the Blennerhassets, built with a broad Italian front, at the head of a large island in the Ohio, near Parkersburg. Dr. Hildreth, in his “ Lives of the Early Settlers,” has preserved a full description of this superb establishment, a para-
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dise in the wilderness, and its accomplished build- ers, and shows that Mr. Wirt’s picture was not so extravagant as has been supposed.
In state affairs the legislature had given evi- dence of its disenthrallment by establishing eight new counties at its first session. By the year 1810 the number had been increased to forty-one, the population of the state, at that time, having risen to 230,760 in number. More than a third of the state had been cast into the Indian Terri- tory. In 1804 the Firelands and all the Reserve west of the Cuyahoga, together with the military lands lying between the Reserve and the treaty line, were purchased from the Indians, and the proprietors of the Firelands incorporated by the legislature. Their names fill more than eighteen pages of the Land Laws of Ohio, where the towns, and the precise loss of each sufferer, in the raids of Tryon and Arnold, are recorded for history. The Connecticut Land Company caused their pur- chase to be surveyed into townships five miles square. Six of these, including Cleveland and Youngstown, were sold. All the rest were sub- divided among the proprietors by the close of the year 1809. Still the W estern Reserve did not move.
In 1805 the directors of the Firelands put them in charge of Taylor Sherman, of Connecti- cut, as their general agent. His mission was accomplished by a full survey, allotment, and partition among the numerous owners, completed in 1811. Mr. Sherman, however, contributed
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more than this to the history of Ohio. In 1810 he was followed by his son, Charles R. Sherman, who had been educated and admitted to the bar in Connecticut, and was now settled in Lancaster. In that distinguished home of lawyers he took a prominent position, and was appointed one of the judges of the supreme court of the state. He died in 1827, while on the circuit. In the earlier volumes of the decisions of that court he has left an enduring monument of his rank as one of the ablest lawyers and judges of the state. Among his chil- dren are General William T. Sherman and Sena- tor John Sherman. Ohio, therefore, may attribute to the Firelands, and the misfortunes by which they were founded, no small share in her promotion.
Another treaty with the Indians, in 1808, secured a roadway between the Firelands and the rapids of the Maumee, with land a mile in width on both sides for settlement ; also a roadway from Sandusky up to the treaty line. But how little it was worth is related by Daniel Sherman, who, in escaping from Huron County to Mansfield at the Indian outbreak in 1812, did not find a cabin or clearing in forty miles. The statutes were prolific of new roads, new counties, and schemes for developing salt-springs and navigable rivers. But there was no money to make them.
A far more important measure was the move- ment by the Ohio senators in Congress for util- izing the two per cent, fund which had been pledged to the state for making a road between
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the Ohio River and tide-water. The special committee to which, on Mr. Worthington’s mo- tion, the subject was referred in 1805, recom- mended the route by way of Cumberland, which became the national road. Under an Act of Congress, March 29, 1806, commissioners were appointed to lay it out. Wheeling was adopted as the crossing place on the Ohio, because it was not only on the direct line to the centres of Ohio and Indiana, but was safer for connection with the navigation of the river. Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia ceded the right of way, and contracts were made in 1808 for con- structing a turnpike road, metaled with broken stone one foot in depth, and nowhere to exceed a gradient of five degrees. This, it was prom- ised by Mr. Gallatin, the Secretary of the Treas- ury, would effect a reduction in freight of one dollar per hundred on all the produce of the West, and its returns from the East. As this would be a gain of two dollars upon every barrel of flour and pork, it will be seen how vitally interesting it was to the people of Ohio. Their crops were profitless. Except on the Ohio and the rivers running to it, there was no outlet for the immense production of which the state was becoming capable. Every year, at the spring freshets, quantities of flour, bacon, pork, whiskey, and the fruits of the country adjacent to the streams were taken in flatboats to New Orleans and the intermediate markets. This would have
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been a most profitable commerce but for the extreme hazards to which these frail and unman- ageable craft were subject. The starting of these fleets annually was a spectacle of great interest at the towns on the Muskingum, Scioto, and the Miami. Keel-boats, built in the fashion of canal- boats, but lighter and sharper, were also used with profit, as by great labor they could stem the current of the Mississippi, and the cargoes which they brought back were the earliest considerable imports of foreign goods. Numbers of sea-going vessels were built on the Ohio River, and freighted with produce to the West Indies or Europe. Marietta alone is reported to have sent to sea, before the war of 1812, seven ships, eleven brigs, six schooners, and two gunboats. The entire commerce of Lake Erie, prior to this time, was carried on by half a dozen little schooners.
Besides their land-locked isolation, the pio- neers, in clearing the forest and turning up the rich mould of their cornfields, encountered a far more desolating adversity in the ague, and vio- lent biliary diseases, with which the soil was in- fected. Another strange pestilence, known as the milk sickness, was rife in certain parts of the state, supposed to be caused by some mysterious vegetable eaten by the cows in the natural meadows or prairie. But with all their draw- backs and early disappointments, the settlers manfully worked, and waited for the good time coming, and enjoyed freedom, peace, and plenty.
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The earliest events which disturbed this life of Arcadian placidity were the Burr Conspiracy, and the war in 1812 between the United States and Great Britain. The former was but a bug- bear, sprung upon the Western people by Mr. Jefferson’s proclamation, November 27, 1806.
The terror excited by this hazy enterprise be- came ludicrous when its actual proportions were known. Mr. Jefferson was probably misled by General Wilkinson, the Belial and arch mischief- maker of his time, and somewhat also by Colonel Joseph Hamilton Daviess, who seems to have beheld the -ghost of the old Spanish conspir- acy stalking abroad. Meade, the acting governor of Mississippi, had been somewhat terrified, but he pricked the bubble by arresting Burr, January 17, 1807, and reporting to Mr. Jefferson, “ This mighty alarm, with all its exaggerations, has eventuated in nine boats and one hundred men, and the majority of these boys or young men just from school.” The trial, however, ran through six months, preponderating, as Chief Jus- tice Marshall thought, in favor of the opinion that Burr’s design was really against Mexico. He was therefore acquitted of the charge of treason, though Mr. John Quincy Adams, in reporting upon the expulsion of the Ohio senator, John Smith, as an accomplice, persuaded the Senate that it was a “ crime before which ordinary treason whitens, and of which war was the mild- est feature.”
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Since Blennerhasset’s Island, where the scheme of this frightful crime was unmasked, was in Vir- ginia, it may be wondered how Ohio became in- volved. Burr had but touched at Blennerhas- set’s, when he went out and returned, in his first sweeping tour in 1805, but as Blennerhasset was absent on both occasions, he made no stay. At Cincinnati he received an ovation. About the 1st of September in the following year he spent two days at Blennerhasset’s. Then, in crossing Ohio to Kentucky, he stopped at Chillicothe. As was the custom in the hospitality of those days, he went uninvited to the residence of a gentle- man near there, with whom he had been asso- ciated in public life at Washington. The host was absent, but Burr was politely entertained by his wife and family, and amused himself with the garden and flowers. He alluded also to his bril- liant scheme at the South. The hostess was a most skillful florist, and in after-days was wont to say she had derived much of it from his in- structions. After waiting two days, Burr took his departure for Kentucky. To a playful re- mark of his hostess as to seeing more of Ohio, he replied, “ No, madam, no ; the Ohio people are too plodding for my purpose.”
This seems to have been all of his campaign in Ohio. But Blennerhasset had been busy at Mari- etta, building boats, recruiting volunteers, and engaging supplies for an expedition or colony on the Wachita River in Louisiana. In all this,
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nothing amiss was suspected by the authorities or the people. But unluckily for Blennerhasset, he dined about this time with the Hendersons on the Virginia shore, and after dinner indulged in some bombast concerning Colonel Burr’s brilliant tal- ents and prospects, which alarmed those gentle- men excessively. They reported it to a Mr. John Graham, who was looking about, as a “ confi- dential agent,” for the President. He had several interviews with Blennerhasset at Marietta, in which the latter explicitly avowed that colonizing the Bastrop or Wachita lands was the object, and that the expedition was to be a strong one, and well armed, whether for Indians, Spanish, or game. Graham informed Blennerhasset of his mission and instructions. He objected to the force, and to the armed character of the plan. Blennerhasset insisted that he had a right to carry out his plans, and that the government had no authority to interfere. This intercourse con- tinued in a friendly way for some days, but sud- denly, after an interview of Graham with the Hendersons, it was dropped. The confidential agent hastened to Chillicothe, where the legisla- ture had just assembled. Upon information and affidavits presented by him to the governor, the legislature hastily passed a law, December 6th, to prevent acts “ hostile to the peace and tranquil- lity of the United States within the jurisdiction of Ohio,” and appropriating one thousand dollars to enforce the provisions of the act.
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Governor Tiffin issued a proclamation of warn- ing, and called out the sheriffs and militia along the Ohio. Under warrants issued to the sheriff at Marietta, General Buel forthwith seized Blen- nerhasset’s ten boats laden with a hundred bar- rels of corn-meal. Blennerhasset himself would have been arrested but for the opportune arrival of Tyler and Smith, two of his adjutants, with thirty men from the Beaver. Graham’s remon- strance, and this sudden expression of public feel- ing, half determined him to abandon the expedi- tion. Mrs. Blennerhasset appears to have rallied his courage, and at midnight, December 10th, hastily packing up a few necessaries, he fled, in the boats of Tyler and Smith, with a force of thirty-one men, armed with five rifles, three or four pairs of pistols, one blunderbus one fusee, and a keg of powder. At the moment of embark- ing there was a question how he should avoid arrest at Gallipolis, and a plan was formed for sending horses to enable him to pass around that place. Mrs. Blennerhasset, who had accompanied him to the boats, again interfered, and sent a canoe to take her husband ahead of the fleet. He and his party eluded the officers at all points and escaped. He never again saw his beautiful home. In the winter of 1811-12 the mansion was totally destroyed by fire.
A little episode followed, which must conclude the story of Blennerhasset’s folly and misfortune. Mrs. Blennerhasset, as has been seen, had been left
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behind with her children. His flight was taken as a clear proof of guilt. The militia of Wood County, Virginia, took possession of the house and island, purveying for themselves by shooting the cattle, consuming the supplies, and burning the fences for firewood, regardless of the woman or her wants. Their colonel, it should be said, stopped this vandalism as soon as informed of it. In the midst of the ravages, Messrs. William Robinson and Morgan Neville, young travelers from Pitts- burgh who were descending the Ohio in a com- fortably fitted flatboat, stopped at the island. They found Mrs. Blennerhasset bewildered, and the militia insolent. The travelers, suspected of having a part in the conspiracy, were arrested by the militia and brought before two magistrates at Marietta for examination. They were so frank and manly, however, in their explanations and professions of mere regard for the unhappy lady, that they were discharged. A night or two after- wards their boat quietly dropped down to a gar- den gate, where Mrs. Blennerhasset and her chil- dren, by a private arrangement, were in waiting. They were found by the gallant young deliverers, and safely transferred to the cabin of the boat. Thus she parted from the fairy isle.
A violent commotion in the state politics was excited for three or four years by a wrangle of the legislature with the courts. Justices of the peace had been granted jurisdiction to try suits, for any amount not exceeding fifty dollars, with-
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out a jury. This the judges of the Common Pleas decided, much to the indignation of the law- makers, was a violation of the right of trial by jury, secured by the Constitution of the United States, in any controversy exceeding twenty dol- lars in value. The decision was sustained by the Supreme Court. The judges were, however, im- peached, and some who were arraigned narrowly escaped conviction. But a new assembly was elected in 1809, and though the majority were of the indignant party, they could not count upon the requisite two thirds in the Senate. Resort was had, therefore, to a more efficacious course. The term of office was seven years, and the term of seven years since the state constitution went into operation was just expiring. Most of the judges had been chosen much later, either as new ap- pointments or to fill vacancies. It was resolved by the majority in both branches of the assembly that their terms of office must all be limited by the original term of those who had been first ap- pointed. The three supreme judges, three presi- dent judges of the Common Pleas, all the asso- ciate judges of that court, more than a hundred in number, and all the justices of the peace, were discharged at a swoop. This radical measure was well named the “ Sweeping Resolution.”
As part of the contention, the seat of govern- ment was transferred at the same session from Chillicothe to Zanesville. Commissioners were ap- pointed to report, at the next session, the “ most
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eligible and central spot for permanently estab- lishing it.” Their selection was Dublin, a village on the Scioto, some fourteen miles above Colum- bus, but this was overruled by the assembly. By an act passed February 14, 1812, a proposal was accepted by which the owners of the “ high bank on the east side of the Scioto River, opposite the town of Franklinton,” then a dense forest, bound themselves to lay off a town ; present a square of ten acres to the state, upon which they were to erect a state-house, and public offices such as the assembly should require ; and furthermore, give twenty acres of land to the state for a penitentiary, and erect a suitable building. By another act the name of Columbus was conferred upon the town, and it was ordained to become the seat of govern- ment of the state on the first Monday of December in the year 1817, but subsequently made a year earlier. The seat of government meanwhile was restored to Chillicothe.
The proximity of the new capital to the Indian boundary indicates the confidence reposed in the Wyandots, who were dwelling just above on the Sandusky Plains. The right of free hunting and passage, which General Wayne gave to the In- dians in the lands they ceded, so long as they were peaceable and orderly, had not been abused. They wandered where they pleased, and com- mitted no disorder when not betrayed by white men with whiskey. The chiefs in their visits were always entertained socially with much dis-
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tinction. Tecumseh, though not yet celebrated, was acquiring importance by the wide-extended, covert movements which it was observed he was making. He visited Chillicothe in 1807 on busi- ness not generally known. In company with Blue Jacket and a party of warriors he was invited to supper by a gentleman concerned in it. They took their places at the table with perfect pro- priety, the mistress of the house presiding, and dispensing her luxuries among them. Suddenly, however, there was a disturbance, and two or three of the younger braves leaped up with angry mutterings, as though bent on mischief. Tecum- seh at the moment was in close conversation with his entertainer, but quickly observing the alarm of the ladies, he arose, drew himself up, and with an expressive glance and a stamp of the foot brought things to order. It was discovered that one of the young bucks, accidentally, had not been served with coffee, and felt himself insulted.
It soon became manifest that mischief was brewing among the Indians on the border of Indi- ana, and that Tecumseh was in it. He was not a chief and had no place in the Shawanees council. The object which he and his wily brother Els- quatawa the Prophet had in view was, to break the power of the chiefs, in their own and all the tribes, whom they suspected of sacrificing the Indian territory and hunting-grounds, in treaties with Governor Harrison, for their own benefit. They withdrew to Greenville, and gathered into
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this Adullam the discontented and disorderly warriors of all the tribes. Here the Prophet, around whom this part of the plot centered, set up a religious order for the reform of the Indians as he professed, by mysterious meetings and cere- monies, to which none were admitted but the initiated. Tecumseh was moving in every direc- tion, urging the hostile elements to combine, in another grand struggle like that of Pontiac and the Northwestern confederates, to drive the whites across the Ohio. Atwater met him among the Onondagas in 1809, and, as interpreter of his speech, told them he had “ visited the Florida Indians, and Indians so far north that snow cov- ered the ground at midsummer.”
The scheme, as usual, was attributed to British intrigues and influence, though it is well known that the governor of Canada, and the British minister at Washington, gave early warning to the United States in 1810 that the Northwestern Indians were meditating war. Governor Harri- son, unfortunately, entertained this prejudice, without being conscious that he was himself the perficient cause of the hatred which drove Te- cumseh and his forces in 1812 into the British alliance.
At this moment when the state, with a quarter million of people, an exuberant soil, a dozen considerable towns, and the prospect of another British and Indian war overhanging it, lay, like a young giant, bound hand and foot, occurred the
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signal event which was to give the Mississippi valley an impetus to an illimitable growth. This was the launching and departure from Pitts- burgh, in October, 1811, of the steamboat Or- leans, first of the mighty fleet which put the currents of the great river to naught. On this voyage Mr. Roosevelt, who had superintended the construction for Messrs. Fulton and Livings- ton, with his young wife and children, Andrew, Jack, the pilot, Baker, the engineer, and six hands, besides domestics, constituted the sole freight. The novel appearance of the craft, and the speed with which it passed through the long reaches of the Ohio, excited wonder and terror among the riparians. Few of them had heard of steamboats. Some supposed the comet, then near, had fallen into the river. War with Eng- land being expected, one little town was alarmed with the cry, “ British are coming ! ” and took to the hills. The Orleans being prevented by low water from passing the falls at Louisville, was employed between that place and Cincinnati during this detention. On the Mississippi she incurred much peril from the effect of the ex- traordinary earthquakes which continued from December until February. She reached her desti- nation December 24th, but neither the Orleans, nor the two steamers from Pittsburgh which followed her in 1813 and 1814, returned to the Ohio. The first which accomplished this was the Enterprise, of Brownsville, Pennsylvania, under
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the command of Henry M. Shreve. In Decem- ber, 1814, he took a cargo of ordnance stores to General Jackson in fourteen days from Pittsburgh. After serving that officer until May, Captain Shreve set out for Pittsburgh, and in twenty-five days arrived at Louisville. For this wonderful feat the people of the town honored him with a public dinner.
Commerce, though still suffering a check east- wardly, now shed some of its genial influence over the valley of the Ohio. The lake shore, and the northwest portion of the state, remained inaccessible. It was not until August, in the year 1818, that the first steamer on Lake Erie, the Walk-in-the- Water, made her appearance, having been built at Black Rock, within a few miles of the spot where the Griffin was launched in 1679. New York as early as 1811 had been agitated with the grand design of connecting Lake Erie with the Hudson. In response to her call, the legislature of Ohio, in January, 1812, had heartily resolved that the cost of such a work should be assumed by the United States. Poverty, and not her will, was at fault.
CHAPTER XII.
WAR AND DEBT.
In the year 1812 Ohio was called to her first essay in war, which, though disastrous and bloody, was without dishonor to the state. It is un- necessary to enter into the causes for which the war against Great Britain was declared by the United States. It was a total surprise to the British Cabinet and to the authorities in Canada. Ohio, for her part, was ready, but terribly han- dicapped. Mr. Madison’s feeble administration had for its war minister Dr. Eustis of Massachu- setts, and for its territorial governor at the North- west, William Hull, of the same state. This superannuated relic of the Revolutionary army unhappily found favor in the eyes of the Secre- tary, and, without a single qualification for the command of an army, was appointed a brigadier- general and commander of the Western depart- ment. The nomination was resisted in the Sen- ate as unfit, but sentiment prevailed. The Ohio senators, unpatriotically it was thought, had voted against the war; professedly for want of preparation, but more, perhaps, under apprehen- sion of danger from the mistake.
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Governor Meigs, under precautionary instruc- tions from Washington, had in April called for twelve hundred volunteers. In May, a larger number assembled at Dayton, and were organized into three regiments : the first, from the Scioto valley, under Duncan McArthur as colonel, and James Denny and William Trimble as majors ; the second, from the Miami valleys, under James Findlay as colonel, and Thomas Moore and Thomas Van Horne as majors ; the third, from the Muskingum and eastern Ohio, supplemented by companies from the Miami and Scioto, com- manded by Lewis Cass as colonel, and Robert Morrison and Jeremiah Monson as majors.
They were mustered into the United States service under General Hull, in the latter part of May, and marched to Urbana. Here they were joined by the 4th U. S. Infantry, under Lieuten- ant-Colonel James Miller, — veterans who had fought at Tippecanoe, and who afterwards, under this gallant commander, charged the British bat- teries at Lundy’s Lane. This gave General* Hull a force of nineteen hundred and fifty troops.
War was not declared until June 18, at which time General Hull was supposed at Washington to have arrived at Detroit. He had, in fact, moved but a few days before from Urbana, and arrived at the rapids of the Maumee on the last of the month. The march of ninety-two miles, under- taken by raw troops and with wagon trains that were forced to make their own road through
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the worst swamps in the state, was effective work, though Hull, in his subsequent defense, reproached his men as undisciplined and insub- ordinate. Besides this work, two stockades had been erected at the crossing of the Scioto and of Blanchard’s Fork ; the former known as Fort McArthur (Kenton), and the latter Fort Find- lay.
At the Maumee, Hull’s military incapacity began to show itself. Finding a small schooner, just arrived from Detroit, he transferred to it the sick, and stores and baggage of the army, sending with his own baggage all his military papers; this, too, although warned by letters received at Fort Findlay that the declaration of war was imminent. The vessel was captured the next day opposite Malden by a British gun-brig, the Hunter, and Hull’s papers were forwarded imme- diately to General Brock, the governor and mili- tary commander of Upper Canada, then on the Niagara. All his instructions, plans, and army rolls were thus betrayed to the enemy by an in- conceivable stupidity which in popular opinion argued nothing less than treason. The proceed- ing was attributed by General Hull, at his trial, wholly to the neglect of the Secretary of War to give him warning. This brought out the fact that on the morning of June 18, in anticipation of the vote by Congress that day, the secretary had written to General Hull to put him on his guard, and in the evening had dispatched an
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express with official notice of their act. The letter failed to reach him, and the despatch was not re- ceived until July 3, two days after he had passed the Maumee.
This loss of a week contrasted most unfavor- ably with the vigilance and alertness of the enemy. Intelligence of the declaration of war by Congress reached New York on the 20th. The agents there of the Northwest Fur Company sent expresses immediately to their heads at Mon- treal and Fort George (mouth of the Niagara). Thus on the 25th the news was known to Gen- eral Prevost, commander-in-chief at Montreal, and to General Brock at Fort George. By the same vigorous agency Brock transmitted the intelligence to Lieutenant-Colonel St. George, commanding the fort at Malden, and sent orders at once to Roberts, the captain of his little gar- rison at Sault Ste. Marie, to gather all possible forces, and capture the United States post at Mackinac. All Canada had been aroused before Hull had passed the Maumee.
The army arrived in Detroit July 5, and Gen- eral Hull could have passed the river that day. Lieutenant-Colonel St. George seemed equally inefficient, but his force was only two hundred men. General Hull was urged by his colonels to cross immediately, but affected to have no author- ity, and felt much more at ease in his fort, fully armed with heavy guns, and having complete command of the river and opposite shore. A
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further despatch from the Secretary arrived on the 9th, authorizing him to commence offensive oper- ations, take Malden, and extend his conquests, “ should his force be equal to the enterprise.” He could no longer resist the urgency of the col- onels, and with most of his force crossed the river July 12; but seizing upon the concluding words of the despatch as a pretext, he encamped at Sandwich, two miles below, and there sat for four weeks without striking a blow. The excuse for stopping was that siege-guns must be remounted and floating batteries constructed before Malden could be assaulted.
McArthur and Cass being the most impatient, the former, with Denny’s battalion of his regi- ment, was detached about the 15th to capture a depot of military supplies at McGregor’s Mills, on the river Thames. This march of sixty miles and back, through the most thickly populated dis- trict in Upper Canada, was accomplished in three days and nights, without the loss of a man, and with the capture of a stock of provisions which would have taken the army through to the Niag- ara River. Cass and his regiment, Colonel Miller accompanying as a volunteer, marched on the 16th to the river Aux Canards, three miles from Mal- den, but was instructed by Hull, as he persist- ently claimed, merely to reconnoitre. Finding the bridge guarded, Cass crossed at a ford further up, and came upon the outpost at the bridge so suddenly that they fled, and he pursued them to
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within gunshot of Malden. Cass wrote to Hull for authority to follow up his advantage. Hull was indignant, but upon receiving a further mes- sage, probably indorsed by Miller, he left the ad- vance guard to their own discretion, but sent no reinforcement.
These circumstances show the impotency of an army without a general. It is mortifying to re- verse the picture and witness the triumph of a general who was without an army. Hull’s large force and early advance had taken the British generals by surprise. Still greater was their chagrin that St. George had suffered the invasion at Sandwich without firing a shot. But General Brock, though young, proved to be as herculean in courage and character as he was in person. His small force of regular troops was already confronting a threatened invasion on the Niagara and Lake Ontario. He sent orders instantly to Captain Roberts, at Sault Ste. Marie, to attack Mackinac, and dispatched Colonel Proctor with a hundred of the 49th Regiment to Malden. He feared it was too late, supposing that Hull would at once advance and sweep Upper Canada. But he did not pause or hesitate an instant in sum- moning every means of resistance. He called a meeting of the provincial assembly. He appealed to Prevost for a few companies of regulars, but they were not to be had. He called out the mili- tia of his province. He was alarmed at finding that numbers were disaffected, and more inclined
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to join Hull than himself. He summoned the Mohawks on# Grand River to send him their war- riors. To his amazement they sent back a mes- sage that they were neutral. This unexpected intelligence, he wrote to Prevost, “ has ruined the whole of my plans, as the militia will now be alarmed and unwilling to leave their families.” He met his provincial assembly July 27th at York (Toronto), and called upon them to vote supplies and martial law. But the majority were disinclined to hostile measures. For ten days General Brock was alternating between them and his troops protecting the Niagara line, inciting the courage of both.
He brought his indefatigable exertions to a crisis, August 6th, by adjourning the assembly, proclaiming martial law upon his own responsibil- ity, and setting out for Long Point, where he had ordered his little force to concentrate. This force consisted of a few regular troops and three hun- dred Canadian militia. With these he embarked on the 8th in farmers’ boats collected from the neighborhood, and coasting two hundred miles along the lake shore, through rain and stormy weather, arrived at Malden at midnight on the 13th, and on Sunday the 16th he had Hull and his army, Detroit and its fort with thirty heavy guns, and the whole frontier of Ohio and Indiana, captive and prostrate before him. Mackinac and Chicago also had fallen, and the savages of the Northwest, now set loose, came trooping to his standard.
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To take suck risks with such disparity of forces would have been simply reckless but for the quick and daring inspiration which prompted the action. Brock’s decision to cross the river was made on discovering that Tecumseh and his Indians al- ready held the opposite shore, and had had three desperate conflicts with detachments sent out by Hull to restore his communications with the Maumee.
At sunrise on the 16th he had taken a strong position five miles below Detroit, with three hun- dred and thirty regulars and four hundred militia, filling the woods on his left and rear with some hundreds of Indians. His bold and sudden ad- vance upon the fort, the critical stroke in this achievement, was conceived only at the moment of landing, when he heard that McArthur, of whom he had a high opinion, was absent, having been detached with five hundred men by a back road to the Maumee. He decided at once to attack, and when within a mile of the fort his inspiration was crowned by the appearance of the white flag of surrender. Hull’s four regiments, under such a general, would have swept the Ni- agara frontier. His pretext that the enemy con- trolled the lake was simply futile. It was enough for him that with the fort at Detroit he held com- plete command of the river, and thus had an open door to Canada.
But General Hull was prostrated by terror of the savages. For cowardice, and not for treason,
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as sometimes insisted, he was sentenced by a court-martial to be shot, but on the recommen- dation of the court was pardoned, in mercy for his age and his good conduct in the old war. His main defense was that he had been victimized by an armistice arranged by Generals Prevost and Dearborn on the Niagara and St. Lawrence, but not extending to the Western army. He therefore had been sacrificed in the interest of the Eastern generals by a measure which enabled the enemy to concentrate their strength upon Detroit.
This ingenious fiction was so plausibly urged, that, although it was .rejected by the court, it is adhered to by many writers. But the judgment of the court has been fully sustained by the dis- closures in the “ Life and Letters of General Brock,” published in 1846. It appears that the armistice was arranged after General Hull’s capitulation, and that General Brock was not aware of it until his return to the Niagara. Flushed with success, he had hastened back for the purpose of striking a similar blow at Sackett’s Harbor. Well for Ohio that it was so. Had General Brock descended upon the Maumee and the Wabash with such a horde of savages as would have attended him, it would be difficult to reckon the consequences.
As it was, the state was panic-stricken. Brave men trembled for the tearful women and children who now clung around them. Even the sick staggered from their beds to escape the appre-
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hended carnage. The Ohio regiments, sent home by Brock on parole, landed their boats near the Huron River, and being taken for the enemy the inhabitants of the Reserve fled en masse . The suspense for a time was dreadful. Governor Meigs called out several brigades of the militia, and fields and crops had to be abandoned. An eye-witness described the country as “ depopulated of men, and the farmer women, weak and sickly as they often were, and surrounded by their help- less little children, were obliged, for want of bread, to till their fields, until frequently they fell exhausted and dying under the toil to which they were unequal. The horrors and fearful suf- ferings of the first year of the war can never be forgotten by the people of that generation.”
Most fortunately, Governor Scott of Kentucky had raised three regiments of volunteers on the first report of Hull’s dereliction, and with equal sagacity had appointed Harrison as a major-gen- eral to command them. Fort Wayne was already assailed by the British and Indians, and with this force Harrison marched on the 29th of August to its relief. At Piqua he was overtaken by an ex- press from Washington bringing his appointment as a brigadier-general. He declined it, however, as it would subject him to the command of Winches- ter, another relic of the Revolutionary army upon whom Mr. Madison had conferred a brigadiership. Pushing through, Harrison broke up the siege of Fort Wayne September 12th, and then surren- dered his command to Winchester.
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This was the first harbinger of safety to the people of Ohio. At Piqua, on his return, he met another express from the President, bearing his commission as a major-general, and appointing him commander-in-chief of the Northwest. This placed him at the head of the regular troops in that department, as well as the Kentucky volun- teers, the militia of Ohio, and of two brigades of militia then on their march from Pennsylvania and Virginia.
Gathering these forces, General Harrison first established a defensive line across the state from Wooster through Upper Sandusky to the St. Mary’s, and thence down to Fort Wayne. He then attempted to form three columns for a con- verging advance to the rapids of the Maumee, intending thence to move upon Detroit. The left was under Winchester at Fort Wayne ; the centre was of Ohio mounted men under Brigadier- General Tupper, on Hull’s road to the Maumee ; and the right, under his own command, was to have moved from Sandusky. Winter closed the campaign before this vexatious combination could be effected, and the people of Ohio had rest.
The campaign of 1813 was preceded by the horrid butchery, at the river Raisin, of a detach- ment of Winchester’s troops, who had rashly been lured there. General Harrison hurried to the Maumee, and at the foot of the rapids erected Fort Meigs. In this strong position he defeated two attempts of General Proctor to carry it by
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siege and bombardment. Proctor’s second failure, in July, was concluded by an attack upon Fort Stephenson, on the Sandusky River (Fremont), a stockade in command of Major George Croghan, with a garrison of a hundred and fifty men, and an armament of one iron six-pounder gun. The desperate and bloody repulse, August 2d, finished the last invasion of Ohio by the British and sav- ages.
Two days afterwards the event occurred upon which the campaign, offensively, was waiting. Commodore Perry’s fleet, constructed at Erie, was, on the 4th, floated across the bar into deep water. He sailed to the head of the lake, to be seen of the enemy, and spent the last ten or twelve days of the month in Sandusky Bay, pre- paring for the impending conflict. General Har- rison contributed a number of able seamen who were found in his army, and riflemen also, to act as marines. Perry took his position at Put- in Bay, to await the enemy ; the British fleet stood out from Malden early in the morning of September 10th, and at 4 o’clock p. M., Perry sent to General Harrison the famous despatch : “ We have met the enemy and they are ours.”
With this powerful auxiliary, Detroit and its fort were flanked, the way across the lake was clear, the war was transferred to Canada, and soon completed. The troops, artillery, and sup- plies were collected at the mouth of the Portage River, and transferred by boats to the Eastern
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Sister, the island nearest to Malden, and there concentrated, September 25th.
The next day Commodore Perry took General Harrison and Governor Shelby, who volunteered to serve under him, to reconnoitre Malden and the neighboring shore. The landing-place was selected ; Governor Shelby sent orders to Colonel Richard M. Johnson, waiting with his mounted brigade at the river Raisin, to advance upon Detroit. The orders for debarkation, march, and the expected battle were issued that evening. On the morning of the 27th the whole army effected a landing, under cover of Perry’s guns, at a point three miles below Malden, eager to redeem the American arms. But Proctor had withdrawn, and the fort and town were sur- rendered without resistance. Detroit, also, sur- rendered on the 29th, and was occupied by Mc- Arthur’s brigade. On the 30th Johnson’s bri- gade of eleven hundred mounted Kentuckians came in at a gallop, and on the next day joined the army in Canada.
This force was awaited before the pursuit of General Proctor should be commenced. He was ascertained to have posted his forces in a strong position at the Moravian towns on the right bank of the Thames, about sixty miles from Detroit. Here he was overtaken October 5th. There was an open beech woods stretching from the river to a morass miles in extent. Midway between the river and the morass was a narrow
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swamp, by which the two wings of Proctor’s forces were divided. Between this swamp and the river his regular troops were drawn up in two lines, supported by artillery on both flanks. The woods between the swamp and the morass were filled with his large force of Indians, said to be two thousand, under command of Tecum- seli.
The position and array of forces was dangerous to attack, but by another military inspiration, quick as that of General Brock at Detroit, a blunder of Proctor was swiftly turned to advan- tage, and the result determined in fifteen minutes. As the Americans approached, General Harrison learned from the keen military eye of his chief engineer, Major E. D. Wood,1 that the British regulars were formed in open order, leaving intervals between the files. His order of battle was immediately changed. A battalion of the mounted men, who were to have operated against the Indians, riders and horses equally trained to dash through woods and thickets, was ordered up ; they charged in line upon the British regulars, received their fire without breaking, and galloped through. Wheeling about, they delivered their fire upon the rear of the disordered British, who were at once routed, and fled with their general pell-mell. Proctor’s carriage and papers, and six brass fieldpieces, trophies of Saratoga, which had been captured at Detroit, were taken. The 1 See Appendix, No. 4.
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battle of Colonel Johnson and the left wing with the Indians was obstinately contested. But Te- cum seh fell at the first fire, and when this and Proctor’s flight became known the enemy gave way and scattered.
This victory was so complete that, as to Ohio, the war of 1812 was terminated. Her soldiers continued in the field under various commanders. Large numbers were in the hot campaign of 1814 on the Niagara. But it is an unpleasing fact, in this as in other matters deeply interesting in the history of Ohio, that the public offices contain no record or trace by which we can determine what soldiers Ohio had in the war of 1812, or what they did.
Peace returned in 1815, but without prosperity or healing in its wings. There was a general state of insolvency which became oppressive when the stimulus of the war was withdrawn and the business created by it ceased. A huge debt to the government had been long accumu- lating, from the unwise expedient, begun in 1800, of selling the public lands on credits of one, two, three, and four years, with interest. Thousands of poor settlers, deluded by this priv- ilege, expended all they had in making the first payment, trusting to their crops, and the rise in value confidently expected, to carry them through. But they were unable to meet further payments.
Another heavy debt had been run up at the local
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banks for accommodation loans, by persons who were eager to build, improve or speculate in lands. In the general stagnation these obliga- tions could not be met, and many of the insti- tutions which had embarked their means chiefly in such loans were as insolvent as their cus- tomers. All the banks, before and during the war, had been issuing paper currency without limit or control, and as specie payments had been suspended in most of the states they were in no condition to meet the resumption in February, 1817, which was required by Congress. In Ohio and other Western states the circulating notes of all banks were below par ; notes of the best Ohio banks were at a discount, in New York, of eight to fifteen per cent. ; others, twenty to twenty-five per cent. Merchandise and agricultural products had two prices, one in specie and another in paper.
The ignorance and perverseness of legislators made these complicated evils worse. Congress had been warned, at an early period, of the mis- chief certain to result from selling the lands on credit, but politicians kept up an outcry that it was “the people’s security against the monopo- lists.” The people suffered to such a degree that, according to Judge Burnet, a debt of $22,000,000 was due to the government in 1820 at the land offices in the West. Congress, in January, 1821, cut the knot by a law permitting the debtors to relinquish the lands not paid for,
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retaining so much as their payments would cover, without interest.
The legislature of Ohio, to cure the ills of the banks, adopted Dr. Sangrado’s treatment, and chartered more of the same sort. A brood of twelve was hatched by a general law passed February 23, 1816. In this job all the banks, old and new, entered into a bargain with the state by which, in lieu of taxes, each of them was to set apart one share in twenty-five of its stock to the state, and accumulate the dividends upon it until the state should own one sixth of the capital. This, however, was to be subject to future legislation, and we may infer how it operated from the fact that in 1825 the legisla- ture relinquished its claim on stock by accepting a tax of two per cent, upon all previous dividends, and four per cent, upon all made thereafter.
This juggling with the banks and the currency led to a heated strife between the Whig and Democratic parties, until the adoption, in Febru- ary, 1845, of a new system, based upon sound and secure principles.
Early in this bank imbroglio there was a bold attempt by the legislature to exclude the Bank of the United States from carrying on business in Ohio. Two branches had been established in 1817 at Cincinnati and Chillicothe. A conflict with the local banks immediately ensued, as the United States Bank had agreed to receive and remit the funds of the land offices for the gov-
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ernment. The Commercial Bank of Lake Erie (Cleveland) in May, 1818, refused to redeem its notes in specie because presented by a United States branch bank. In a card issued by Mr. Alfred Kelly and the directors, this action was upheld on the ground that the avowed object of the United States Bank was to destroy the coun- try banks, drain the country of specie, oppress the public, and endanger the liberties of the people. In February, 1819, a tax of 150,000 upon each of the branches was assessed, if they should continue to carry on business after Sep- tember 1st. Ralph Osborn, the auditor of state, summarily took from the Chillicothe branch mon- eys sufficient to cover the tax upon both. In a celebrated suit by the bank against the auditor, the Supreme Court of the United States reiter- ated its previous judgment, that banks estab- lished by the United States as government agen- cies cannot be taxed by a state, and decided a still more subtle point, that, as the auditor was a mere trespasser, he could not escape on the ground that the suit, though nominally against him, was really against the State. It was upon this that the legislature, under the advice of their eminent leader and counsel, Charles Hammond, had princi- pally relied. The manifesto, composed by Mr. Hammond, which they put forth in the heat of the contest, was regarded as a matchless exposi- tion of state rights. The rage against the bank was such that General McArthur, one of its chief
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supporters in the legislature, with all his popu- larity, lost his election in Ross County. But the storm and the manifesto alike were dispelled by the majestic logic of the Chief Justice.
The establishment of the state capital at Co- lumbus was celebrated December 3, 1816, by the first meeting there of the legislature and gov- ernor. Governor Worthington’s speech forcibly presented the financial disadvantages from which the state was suffering. As objects also claiming particular attention of the assembly, he pointed to the necessity of having public schools and better roads. In his speech to the next assem- bly he brought before them again the importance to the state of organizing a system of free schools, and putting it into operation. The great difficulty of procuring teachers led him to suggest a normal school at the seat of government as the solid foundation for such a superstructure.
Nothing now intervened between the pioneer stage and the completion of the state in its full territorial sway but an adjustment with the Indians. This was quickly and satisfactorily ac- complished by treaties with the various tribes, at conventions held in 1817 and 1818, by Gen- erals Cass, McArthur, and others, as commis- sioners of the United States. All that part of the state north of the Greenville treaty line and west of the Firelands was ceded for annuities perpetually secured to each tribe, but large tracts reserved by each for their homes. Subsequently
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these reservations on the Sandusky, the Auglaize, and at Wapakoneta were exchanged by the tribes, one after another, for larger tracts west of the Mississippi, until all were removed. The last of them, the Wyandots, filed through the streets of Cincinnati in the summer of 1841, a motley train in this migration.
The northwest quarter of the state was divided in February, 1820, nominally, into fourteen coun- ties, unorganized, of course, as there were not citizens enough in half of them to form a grand jury. Ohio thus, after many mutations of sov_ ereignty and ownership, became at length a state in her own right.
What appearance this new country and people wore, in those days, is briefly told in the diary of Dr. John Cotton, a young physician from Ply- mouth, Massachusetts, who settled himself soon after the war at Marietta. He was of the im- pression that the Ohio Company had not been en- tirely judicious in their choice, and in November, 1815, went upon a short tour of observation.
At Zanesville he found an active, enterprising population of two or three hundred, busy in dig- ging a short canal through rock, for a water- power and factories. To pay the expense a pri- vate bank was issuing bills, which were in good credit. Coal already was used exclusively for fuel. Lancaster was a flourishing town of eight hundred or a thousand people, mostly Germans, and was surrounded by beautiful farms. On
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Zane’s Road numerous wagons of 44 movers ” were going west, camping at nights like Indians around their fires. Chillicothe, still the capital, was re- ported to be very sickly, from its low position, but no town which Dr. Cotton visited 46 disap- pointed him more agreeably.” It was then the second town in the state in population, having three or four thousand inhabitants, and 44 in point of appearance the finest in the state.” Turning thence up the rich valley of the Scioto, he found a curiosity in the dry prairie of the Pickaway Plains, and still more in the circle and mound of the aborigines upon which Circleville had five years before been built. He was also struck by the patriotism displayed in the signs at the tav- erns, which most commonly bore the names of Washington, Lafayette, Jackson, and other Amer- ican heroes. Of Columbus, which had been se- lected as the future seat of government, we give Dr. Cotton’s account in his own words : —
44 It is of only three years’ growth, and yet, strange to tell, it contains two hundred houses and seven hundred inhabitants. The streets are filled with stumps of trees and environed with woods, which give the town the ap- pearance of having just emerged from the forest. The houses, generally, are small and indifferent, and, as the town was laid out on a large scale, considerably scat- tered. The people have been collected from every quarter, and having great diversity of habits and man- ners, of course, do not make the most agreeable com- pany. An elegant state-house is here being erected,
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about eighty feet square, constructed of brick, and fin- ished with elegant white marble. One thing seems truly ridiculous. Inscriptions are set up over the doors on beautiful slabs of marble, taken from Joel Barlow’s Columbiad, holding forth the detestable principles of the French Revolution. Another large building is likewise going up for the purpose of state offices. There is a state prison also, or, as it is here called, a penitentiary for convicts, though quite too small, one would be apt to judge, for that purpose.”
From Columbus, Dr. Cotton returned by way of Athens, much disappointed at not finding the expected university, though it had been chartered fifteen years before. It was only an academy. The trustees were about to employ a professor of mathematics, and were talking of building a col- lege one hundred and sixty-six feet in length, but when it would actually be erected was prob- lematical. The president, an excellent man, was officiating as the parish minister.
As to schools, Dr. Cotton rated the state as deficient. There were academies in the principal towns, but schoolmasters in general met with little encouragement. The state of religion, like that of schools, was less favorable than he could have wished. But Dr. Cotton, it is to be observed, had come from the very centre of schools and churches. There were Presbyterian ministers in all the principal towns, and a few of the Congre- gationalists. The famous Lorenzo Dow, of no sect, was preaching through Ohio to crowded au-
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diences. At Marietta he preached three times in the forenoon and twice in the afternoon, without hymn or prayer. The Methodists were numerous and widespread ; they afforded a great privilege, the doctor thought, where no other worship was to be had, but often “ productive of enthusiasm and delusion.” Camp-meetings were held, usually for three or four days ; the ministers, sometimes to the number of fifteen or twenty, holding forth in rotation. Bible societies also were forming. Of the north part of Ohio, Dr. Cotton says only that it was flat and marshy, and still called New Connecticut.
Three years later, in August, 1818, William Darby, the gazetteer, sailed up Lake Erie from Buffalo to Detroit, just too soon to witness the first trip of the Walk-in-the- Water, in that month. Approaching Ohio he found the settlements more rare, and the borders of the lake covered by a vast forest. Fairport, Painesville, and Cleveland are described as the only flourishing places he saw, but they made a fair show of stores, mills and machinery, besides wearing an airy and healthy appearance; Cleveland had also a bank and a printing-office, and from its direct line of communication with Pittsburgh and Detroit, was a place of consequence. Sandusky, then called Portland, and the now beautiful little city of Nor- walk, had just been established. But in Huron County Judge Todd had opened the courts in 1815. At the east end of the Reserve, Warren
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and Youngstown, from their proximity to Pitts- burgh and the channels of commerce, had both acquired importance and were engaged in a con- test for the county seat, which far outlasted the Trojan war in duration. Except these points, northern Ohio was wrapped in a commercial and political seclusion which really was not termi- nated until the opening of the great Hudson and Erie Canal. The most populous and flourishing part of the state at this time, it need hardly be added, was at the southwest, in the broad and fertile expanse of the Miami valley. Besides this immense agricultural back country, Cincin- nati had great commercial advantages, from its position on the Ohio River, and the military and political influences in its favor. It was not until 1817, however, that Captain Shreve, with the steamer Washington, had effected such regular and stated passages between New Orleans and the Ohio as to overcome the terrible obstacles of the Mississippi, and “ convince the despairing public that steamboat navigation would succeed on the Western rivers.”
In 1820 Cincinnati had grown to an incorpo- rated city, with a population between ten and eleven thousand in numbers. It was not only considerable in its commerce and manufactures, but also in numerous religious, literary, and be- nevolent institutions and enterprises, admirably described in the 64 Picture of Cincinnati,” by Dr. Daniel Drake, published in 1815, a book which
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gave a great impulse to the growth and fame of the city. What metropolitan airs it had now ac- quired may be inferred from the existence, among its establishments in 1820, of water- works, which supplied the city from the Ohio River, of four newspapers, a theatre, two museums, and a piano factory.
At the end of this second decade of the cen- tury Ohio numbered in the census 581,295 inhab- itants. The name of “ The Yankee State,” which it had obtained at the West, sent abroad a gen- eral impression that the emigration from New England was large, but it was not so. The ap- pellative was given by the Kentuckians and Vir- ginians ; it bore a hostile sense, and signified the deep-seated jealousy already felt by the Southern neighbors toward the free institutions on the north side of the Ohio. Nine tenths of the peo- ple were agricultural or pastoral, lands and cattle still being the chief wealth. But besides the di- versity of origin, already explained, which has had a marked influence upon the character and history of the state, the position of Ohio had ena- bled her to receive and retain the flower of the emigration which was proceeding from all quar- ters to the Northwest, and thus she was favored with a larger proportion of intelligent and culti- vated society than was drawn in later years to the frontier. There was not only the spontaneous hospitality and friendliness so common to the pioneers, but tourists at this early period were
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charmed to find, at various points in Ohio, circles of polite and refined people living in plain houses and with but little expense or show. There were such incongruities as silver spoons, and even forks, not only in use, but manufactured in Ohio, in those days, as divers treasured relics prove. General Lafayette, DeWitt Clinton, and Bern- hardt, the Duke of Saxe Weimar, visited Ohio in the years 1825-6, and all observed this early influence. Levasseur, the secretary of Lafayette, and writer of his tour, states that the general, in his astonishment at this new creation and the delicate attentions he received, exclaimed that Ohio was the eighth wonder of the world.
CHAPTER XIII.
PROGRESS.
From these beginnings to the present condition there is a long stride, in which but a few results or leading events can be taken into view as way- marks in the progress of the state.
The problem of development had become criti- cal and interesting. Here was half a million people, with a superabundance of fertile lands and products absolutely free, dependent on their own labor, having but little money, and in a meas- ure shut up. Thousands were pouring in, but the question was how to get their products out. A prodigious trade in driving cattle, horses, and hogs to the eastern market seemed possible after the war of 1812, but the bad roads and want of for- age made it hazardous. The Rev. Timothy Flint, journeying to the West in November, 1815, en- countered a drove of a thousand cattle and hogs in the Alleghany Mountains, “ of an unnatural shagginess and roughness like wolves, and the drovers from Mad River were as untamed and wild in their looks as Crusoe’s Man Friday.” Commerce in the other direction, down the Mis- sissippi, was subject to even greater perils. Steam
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navigation was for years almost hopeless against the disasters of snags, bursting boilers, and inex- perienced engineers and pilots.
But the difficulty of the situation brought forth measures which created the era of Ohio’s great growth and prosperity. New York, as we have seen, had invited Ohio in 1815, to join her in the scheme of connecting the Hudson with Lake Erie. In December, 1816, another communication came from DeWitt Clinton, the president of the New York Canal Commission, urging the vital impor- tance of the work to Ohio. Governor Brown, in a special message in 1819, argued forcibly in favor of a canal project by which Ohio might profit directly in the great work already com- menced in New York. The assembly were so far aroused that they appointed commissioners to re- port whether a canal was practicable, but made it dependent upon the aid of Congress, and this caused another delay.
The subject of common schools was brought before the legislature about the same time by an exposure of the shameless squandering of the school lands, which, under cover of legislative pro- ceedings, had been going on for seventeen years. Atwater, who was in the legislature in 1821 and one of the investigators, is authority for the state- ment that by this legislative trickery one senator contrived to get seven sections of the school lands into the clutches of himself and his family, and that the state lost, at a low estimate, a million
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dollars. The assembly had treated the abuses with much the same indifference as it had shown upon the subject of roads and canals. The only attempt they had made at a school law was an act passed in January, 1821, permitting the profits from the lands to be applied to the erection of schoolhouses, but requiring the tuition to be paid by the people of the district.
At the session of 1821-22 a combination was formed in the assembly between the friends of canals and schools, and on the same day, January 31, 1822, two measures were adopted. One was an act appointing commissioners to report a route for a canal to connect Lake Erie with the Ohio River. The other was a resolution authorizing the governor to appoint commissioners to report a common - school system for the state. This canal commission, aided by engineers who had had experience in planning the New York and Erie work, were engaged three years in investi- gating and comparing four possible lines : one by way of the Maumee and Big Miami valleys ; an- other through the valleys of the Sandusky and Scioto rivers ; the third by the way of the Cuya- hoga and Muskingum ; and the fourth by Grand River and the Mahoning. In January, 1825, after every possible test, they recommended the two lines now known as the Ohio Canal and the Miami and Erie. Their report was adopted, and an act was passed by the assembly February 4, 1825, appointing a board of canal commissioners
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to construct the Ohio Canal complete from Ports- mouth to Cleveland, and that part of the Miami Canal located between Cincinnati and Dayton. Another board, styled commissioners of the canal fund, was established by the same act, to raise such loans as the canal commissioners might re- quire. As an indication of the character and credit which the state by this energetic policy had acquired, the first sale of Ohio bonds, in 1825, was $400,000, at the rate of 97 \ per cent., but all subsequent sales were at a premium.
The shout of joy and the blaze of illumination which went up from the hills and valleys of Ohio, as the news of this prompt action of the assembly traversed the state, was a jubilation such as never before had happened northwest of the Beautiful River. The 4th of July was selected as the day for the commencement of work on the Ohio Canal, and DeWitt Clinton, now governor of New York, was invited to strike the first shovel into its excavation. The Licking Summit, near Newark, was the place selected for the ceremony. Governor Clinton was greeted by Governor Mor- row with a most happy allusion to his former exer- tions for the admission of Ohio into the Union, “ in no small degree owing to his espousal of her cause ” as a senator in Congress. Thomas Ewing, then growing to the prime of his strong intellect and fame, was the orator of the day. After this grand gala, Governor Clinton made a tour through southern Ohio, encouraging and confirming the
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spirit of the people in the great work they had begun, and adding immensely to the success with which it was prosecuted.
The Miami Canal to Dayton was commenced in 1826. This and the Ohio Canal were com- pleted in 1883, and the entire system finished in 1842, at a total cost of $14,688,666.97. This comprehended 658 miles of canals proper, or 796 miles, if navigable slack water, feeders, side cuts, and reservoirs be reckoned.
The effect of these improvements upon the growth and prosperity of the state can hardly be exaggerated. They lifted Ohio as it were into a new sphere. They opened to her farmers and merchants the markets of the Ohio, the lakes, and New York. They enhanced the value of the lands as well as of the products. They opened inter- course with the northern and northwestern parts of the state, built up Cleveland, Toledo, Akron, Massillon, and many lesser marts, and thus tended to unite a long segregated people as well as to make them prosperous. They brought a large accession of population and capital, and gave the state a name and character throughout the coun- try of which her sons justly began to be proud.
Of the later system of the railways, first intro- duced in Ohio in 1832, and the turnpike system into which the state was inveigled in 1837 by a statute known as the “ plunder law,” it is im- practicable, and indeed unnecessary, to make more than this mention.
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The advocates of common schools in the mean- while had not been so successful, and perhaps not so wise. The commissioners appointed in 1822 made a report, and published it broadcast through the state. But it met with no favor in the next assembly. Many influential men opposed it. One objection was that the proposed school tax was not authorized by the Constitution. This was met and overthrown by the clause transmitted from the Ordinance, declaring that as religion, morality, and knowledge were essential to the government, u schools and the means of instruc- tion shall forever be encouraged by legislative provision,” and upon this single warrant the legis- lature, February 5, 1825, passed the first act establishing free schools in Ohio. But the tax of one mill on the dollar, which it authorized, was insufficient, and the schools conducted under these initial laws would perhaps have left no trace of their existence but for a passage in the “ Tour of Lafayette in America ” worth transcribing : —
“ On the morning after his arrival in Cincinnati, in May, 1825,” says the secretary, “ the first honors which the general received at sunrise were from the boys and girls belonging to the public schools. Assembled to the number of six hundred, under the superintendence of their teachers, these children were ranged in the princi- pal street, where they made the air echo with ‘ Welcome to Lafayette.’ When the general appeared before them their young hands scattered flowers under his feet, and Dr. Ruter advancing delivered him an address in their name,” etc.
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The act of 1825 has been followed, from that time to the present, by statute upon statute, each fraught, as their authors fancied, with the latest and most advanced methods and ideas, but all so perishable and abortive that none but theorists and empiricists would seem to have had the field. This in some degree explains the hostility to pub- lic schools which so often breaks forth. The mis- fortune has been in attempting too much. Instead of accomplishing a few things thoroughly, the common schools have been overloaded with super- fluities foreign to their purpose. The main abuse is in subordinating these invaluable institutions to private and eleemosynary interests instead of holding them sacredly to the public service and welfare. The other evil, consequent upon the first, is defective or inefficient instruction; too much stress upon percentages, and far too little upon manners and character. The result of the constant mutations is, that as a system little is left but the tax and a general supervision ; the state virtually surrendering its schools to a thousand local influences over which it exerts little or no inspection or control. There is no normal school as a centre. Amid the differences in its thousands of fractured parts the people of the state are suf- fering the greatest inequalities in their schools. But with all their shortcomings the public schools have been a pillar of the state, and of priceless value to its people.
The colossal proportions to which they have
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grown, and the work they are doing, will appear by a few gleanings from the commissioner’s re- port for the year 1887. Oat of a population of 3,198,062 (by the census of 1880) there were enrolled during the year in the public schools of Ohio 767,030 youths between the ages of five and twenty-one years ; and of these 519,110, on an average, attended the year through, at 12,589 schoolhouses, and a total cost of $9,909,812.12. The following table exhibits their studies, and clearly points out the dividing line between the schools and the great mass of the people :
BRANCHES TAUGHT, AND NUMBER IN EACH,
A. D. 1887.
Beading 681,328
Writing 650,597
Arithmetic 599,597
Geography 345,485
English Grammar 217,632
Composition 211,053
United States History 99,022
General History 6,025
Drawing 165,680
Vocal Music 202,345
Map-drawing 51,101
Oral lessons 205,949
Physical Geography 10,961
Physics 10,470
Physiology . . . * 11,144
Botany 2,893
Geometry 6,009
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Trigonometry 1,361
Surveying 160
Literature . 4,666
Chemistry 2,227
Geology 960
German 47,7 49
Astronomy 2,729
Book-keeping .3,799
Algebra 18,044
Natural History 1,024
Mental Philosophy 630
Moral Philosophy 207
Logic 34
Rhetoric 3,435
Science of Government 3,418
Political Economy 277
Latin 7,278
Greek 207
French 83
Besides the immense subsidy for schools pro- vided by Congress, it will not have been over- looked that two townships in the Ohio Company’s purchase were set apart for a college, and one in the Miami purchase for the more humble lot of an academy ; both, however, bloomed forth at an early period, under the imposing names, respec- tively, of the Ohio University, at Athens, and the Miami University, at Oxford. Some conception of the advance of Ohio upon these early lines in higher literature and the arts may be gained from the further statement in the commissioner’s re- port, that in 1887 the state had ten universities
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and nineteen colleges, with 2,378 students, male or female, and that 313 were graduated during the year. The import of these high-sounding names and numbers is seriously marred, however, by a statement, said to be authentic, that more than a hundred and fifty students from Ohio were to be found at the same time in the colleges of the Eastern states.
In noting this development of literary and scientific culture in Ohio, it would be ungracious not to give her the meed of honor for having built and established the first regularly equipped public astronomical observatory in the United States. It was founded chiefly by the enthusi- asm and efforts of Professor Ormsby M. Mitchell, and the corner-stone was laid in November, 1842, by the ex-president, John Quincy Adams. It has been surpassed by observatories of later founda- tion, but it is nevertheless entitled to this prece- dence in history.
The great donations of lands for school pur- poses made by Congress to this and other West- ern states had naturally been regarded by the country as a mere largess. But in Ohio they were by no means accepted in that light. Reso- lutions were adopted by the legislature of Mary- land, about the year 1820, asserting a claim for similar appropriations of lands to the original states for the support of schools. This led to a spirited response by the legislature of Ohio, in January, 1822, of much historical interest, in
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which it was shown that by the enhanced prices exacted by the United States from the purchasers of the other thirty-one sections, in each town- ship, in consideration of the dedication of section sixteen, the gift had been repaid ten times over.
This session of the assembly, which gave an impulse to the canals and schools, seems to have been possessed of a militant spirit. Retaliatory measures were adopted against New York for enforcing on Lake Erie the law of 1808, by which the exclusive navigation of her waters by steam had been granted to Livingston and Ful- ton. But this monopoly was soon afterwards de- feated by a judgment of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Another conflict in which Ohio became in- volved, in 1835, with the high powers of Michi- gan Territory, was near being tragical. An im- portant portion of the state was involved, and it has been so much misunderstood on both sides that a brief explanation, taken from the report of a committee of Congress, may be offered.
In the enabling act for admitting Ohio into the Union, the north boundary proposed by Con- gress was the east and west line through the south extreme of Lake Michigan mentioned in the Ordinance of 1787. On Mitchell’s map, which then was the government standard, this extreme of Lake Michigan was laid down as in latitude forty-two degrees and twenty minutes north. But the east and west line was not fixed as the boun-
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dary. On the contrary, liberty was expressly re- served by Congress in the act to annex the terri- tory north of it to Ohio, or dispose of it in any other manner conforming with the Ordinance. Meanwhile it was to be part of Indiana Territory. The convention which formed the Constitution of Ohio had information which led them to insert in it a proviso that in case Lake Michigan should be found to extend so far south that this east and west line intersected Lake Erie east of the mouth of the Maumee River or Bay, then, with the assent of Congress, the north boundary of Ohio should be in a line to be drawn from the south extrem- ity of Lake Michigan to the North Cape at the mouth of the Maumee. The Constitution was accepted by Congress, and upon it Ohio became a state. But as the country was occupied by Indians, no attention was then given to the boundary.
In January, 1805, Michigan Territory was set apart from Indiana Territory and the east and west line through the head of Lake Michigan was the dividing line. But when Indiana was ad- mitted as a state in 1816, her north boundary was established ten miles north of the Michigan line ; and the north boundary of Illinois, when admitted in 1818, was established more than fifty miles north of the line through the head of Lake Michigan. The act, moreover, declared that the residue of Michigan Territory north of Indiana was to remain subject to the disposal of Congress.
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This was decisive that the east and west line referred to in the Ordinance was not considered by Congress as restricting the north boundary of the three states on the Ohio River ; secondly, that the territory of Michigan was still at the disposal of Congress for the purpose contem- plated, if not pledged in the Ohio Enabling Act and Constitution.
Repeated applications were made to Congress by the Ohio assembly to settle the boundary, and various surveys were executed. By an act of Congress, in May, 1812, the surveyor-general was directed to cause a survey of the east and west line as soon as the Indians would permit it, and to report a plat showing where it intersected Lake Erie. Mr. Harris, a deputy, was sent to survey this line in 1817, but, unduly magnifying his office, he proceeded to run the “ north boun- dary line of Ohio,” as he styled it, on the course from the North Cape of Maumee Bay to the head of Lake Michigan. This was called the “ Harris line.” But since it was not in compli- ance with the order of Congress, another deputy, John A. Fulton, executed the survey in 1818, and ascertained that the line in question, if extended due east, crossed the Maumee some miles above Toledo, and intersected the shore of Lake Erie considerably east and south of the Maumee Bay. This was the “ Fulton line,” so called.
Another survey, ordered by Congress in July, 1832, was executed by Captain A. Talcott, of the
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engineers. By astronomical observations, as well as by surveys made with great accuracy in 1833 and 1834, he ascertained that the south extreme of Lake Michigan was in latitude 41 degrees, 37 minutes, and 7 seconds north ; 'and that this line, ' produced due east, crossed the Maumee and inter- sected Lake Erie very nearly as reported by Fulton. He found, also, that the most southerly bend in Lake Erie (near Huron) is in latitude 41 degrees and 23 minutes north ; and the middle of the lake, between this and Point Pelee, oppo- site, is 41 degrees, 38 minutes, and 21 seconds north.
Thus the north boundary of Ohio, extended literally as proposed in the enabling act, would cut off not only Toledo and the north range of townships in Lucas, Fulton, and Williams coun- ties, but, passing south of the boundary lines be- tween the United States and Canada, would have taken off a part of Ashtabula, all of Lake, and portions of Geauga and Cuyahoga counties.
Obviously, therefore, her right to have the con- sent of Congress to the change stipulated in the Constitution was irresistible, notwithstanding the dictum of Mr. John Q. Adams. But it is equally obvious that without the consent of Congress the right was imperfect. The question stood simply between the United States and Ohio, and upon that footing ; and there was no doubt that Con- gress, on receiving Captain Talcott’s report, would consent.
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Before this could be accomplished, there wa3 a rupture, in December, 1834. The legislative council of Michigan, with the same lofty idea of their functions as that held by Mr. Harris the surveyor, instructed their acting governor, Ste- vens Thompson Mason, an ardent young Virgin- ian, to appoint commissioners to treat in behalf of Michigan with the three states of Ohio, Indi- ana, and Illinois for an adjustment and final set- tlement of their north boundaries. Governor Lucas of Ohio, to whom this was formally com- municated by Mason, instead of referring it to the President as an act of foolish arrogance, saw fit to make a similar blunder, and sent the papers to the general assembly of Ohio, then in session, with a message advising that prompt and effec- tive measures be taken for extending the juris- diction of Ohio up to the “ boundary specified in her constitution.” The legislature, sharing in the same spirit, passed laws accordingly, Febru- ary 23, 1835, with a preamble not only hurling defiance at Michigan, but giving the United States to understand that it “ ill becomes a mil- lion of freemen to humbly petition, year after year, for what justly belongs to them and is com- pletely within their own control.”
Michigan, however, had not waited for this fulmination of the Ohio assembly. Her fiery young governor no sooner saw the message of Governor Lucas than he ordered out General Brown and the militia to resist the Buckeye in-
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vasion. The council passed a law prohibiting the exercise or abetting of any foreign jurisdic- tion within the limits of Michigan, under peril of fine and imprisonment. A party of Ohio commis- sioners, peaceably re-surveying and marking the 44 Harris line,” in April, were routed and their surveyors and assistants captured by General Brown and committed to jail. The judge and officers of an Ohio court appointed to be held at Toledo, September 1, were likewise arrested by an armed force. The President (General Jack- son), in a spirit somewhat new to his character, was gently remonstrating with both parties all through the summer. Governor Mason, by an act of disrespect, however, aroused his more nat- ural mood, and was summarily dismissed from office. The 44 tempest in a tea-pot ” gradually subsided. Congress met, and by an act passed June 13, 1836, confirmed the boundary which Ohio had claimed, and admitted Michigan as a state upon the express condition that she yielded the point.
The annexation of Texas in 1846 brought on the war with Mexico. It was to have been a 44 bloodless achievement.” But the President, by a transcendent stretch of power, ordered General Zachary Taylor to occupy the left bank of the Rio Grande. The Mexican generals fell upon the little army, tempted by its inferiority in quan- tity, but in two vigorous assaults were foiled and defeated by its superiority in quality. The
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President announced to Congress that “ war ex- isted,” and fifty thousand volunteers and ten mil- lion dollars were promptly voted to sustain him. Twenty thousand volunteers were called out, and a quota of three thousand assigned to Ohio.
Forty companies reported at Camp Washing- ton, near Cincinnati ; thirty were accepted and formed into three regiments, which under Colonels Alexander M. Mitchell, George W. Morgan, and Samuel R. Curtis, embarked and joined General Taylor, on the Rio Grande, in July. In the fol- lowing year some additional battalions were raised in Ohio, the whole number sent by her to Mexico being 5,536, rank and file. Mitchell’s regiment, the only one in battle, took a distin- guished part in the storming of Monterey, and lost severely in killed and wounded.
The great loss of Ohio was in the death of Brigadier-General Thomas L. Hamer, a man of strength, influence, and character, surpassed by none of his contemporaries. As a representa- tive in Congress he had sustained the administra- tion in its Texan policy, and on the call for vol- unteers he enlisted at once as a private. He soon received a commission as brigadier-general, and how well he bore it is best told in General Tay- lor’s own words : —
Camp near Monterey, December 31, 1846.
Sir: It becomes my melancholy duty to report the death of Brigadier- General Hamer, of the volunteer service, who expired last evening after a short illness.
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The order to the army announcing this sudden dis- pensation expresses but feebly the high estimation in which the deceased was held by all who knew him. In council I found him clear and judicious, and in the administration of his command, though kind, yet always impartial and just. He was an active participant in the operations before Monterey, and since had com- manded the Volunteer division. His loss to the army at this time cannot be supplied, and the experience which he daily acquired in a new profession rendered his services continually more valuable. I had looked forward with confidence to the benefit of his abilities and judgment in the service which yet lies before us, and feel most sensibly the privation.
I am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
Z. Taylor,
Major-General U. S. A.
The Adjutant-General, Washington, D. C.
Unimportant as this war in itself was for Ohio, it produced an upheaval of the state in its conse- quences. The annexation of Texas had excited profound 'distrust and alarm. The change of base made by the nomination of General Taylor by the Whigs, as their candidate for the presidency, brought about a schism which for years had been avoided. From that time the cloud, w no bigger than a man’s hand,” grew and darkened the coun- try until the culmination of the storm at Mr. Lin- coln’s election.
The history of the change in public opinion which now took place in Ohio is a curious one. Just when or how the anti-slavery temper became
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thoroughly aroused, has not been accurately traced. Ohio, politically, had been antagonistic to slavery from the beginning. This appears not only in her constant adhesion to the Ordi- nance of 1787 in every attempt to suspend or qualify it, but her senators and representatives in Congress were on various occasions, notably in January, 1820, during the Missouri controversy, urged to the utmost exertions to prevent the in- troduction of slavery into any of the territories or into any new state thereafter admitted into the Union.
But oddly associated with this fixed principle, all along from the territorial period down to a time somewhere between 1830 and 1836, there had been a certain tacit tolerance of slavery by the people of the state, so that Southern slave- owners visiting Ohio, or traveling through, were accompanied by their servants, without question, and by a sort of common concession of right. Numbers of slaves, as many as two thousand it was sometimes supposed, were hired in southern Ohio from Virginia and Kentucky, chiefly by farmers.
But during the five years preceding 1840 all this had ceased, and slaves who were brought into the state were not only enticed away, or dis- charged by writs of habeas corpus procured in their names, but numbers were abducted from the slave states and concealed or smuggled by the “ underground railroad” into Canada. The
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u abolitionists,” as they were indiscriminately called, had become fanatical and lawless in their delirium of conscience, while rioters and mobs took equal pleasure in affording them opportu- nity for martyrdom.
About the year 1842 the struggle assumed a different phase. The extreme abolitionists, such as Messrs. Birney, Garrison, Lovejoy, and Abby Kelly, were abandoned, and the Liberty party formed, better known as Free-Soilers, of whom Mr. Chase, a Whig in 1841, was an early leader. They renounced all pretensions of abolishing slavery in the states where it was already fixed, but would “ draw a ring of fire around them ” im- passable by a slave.
This was the party which sorely tried Ohio, and taxed the utmost strategy of the Whig lead- ers, who found themselves no longer contending with the blind fury of the abolitionists, but with the political sagacity of men taunted and enraged by the manifest intention of the slave states to reverse the original policy of the Union. It was the tact and influence of men like Messrs. Gid- dings and Wade, in counteracting Mr. Chase and his associates, that had enabled the Whig party in Ohio to keep the question of slavery so long out of politics ; but by the choice of General Tay- lor the dikes were swept away. The Califor- nia intrigues and then the Kansas-Nebraska plots helped to swell the flood, and in the war which ensued slavery was forever ingulfed. This super-
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ficial glance will serve to explain the attitude in which Ohio was found when the war broke out.
Before turning to that subject, it is worthy of notice that in all the growth and prosperity of Ohio in population, public works, material wealth, and other achievements of her people, there was nothing more conspicuous than the humanity dis- played in her wide circle of benevolent insti- tutions. As early as 1827 an institution for educating deaf and dumb people was incorpo- rated. In 1831 it was adopted, and has ever since been maintained by the state. In 1837 a similar establishment for instructing the blind was founded, and in the following year an asylum for the insane.
Without attempting to follow out the gradual development of the system, we may observe that the state now sustains six spacious asylums at various points for the relief of the insane, be- sides a seventh conducted by contract, and an “ Institution for feeble-minded youth ; ” also sep- arate institutions for the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind, a Working Home for the Blind, a Boys’ Industrial School, a Girls’ Industrial Home, a Home for the Orphans of Ohio Soldiers and Sailors (Xenia), and is erecting an Ohio Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Home (Sandusky). The sum ap- propriated by the state for all these objects for the year 1888 is $1,519,764.30, of which $966,- 348.70 goes to the asylums for the insane, and
ifeMi
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$114,462.03 to that for “feeble-minded youth.” To the casual observer, such statistics indicate a surprising proportion of mental disease or aber- ration for a people where the conditions of life are so easy as in Ohio.
CHAPTER XIV.
OHIO IN THE WAR FOR THE UNION.1
The assault on Fort Sumter found the legisla- ture of Ohio meditating plans for reconciliation and compromise. On the 16th of April, 1861, within twenty-four hours after the President’s call for 75,000 troops, the Senate, with but one dissentient, passed a bill appropriating one mil- lion dollars for military purposes ; and on the next day, with but eight votes in the negative, ratified the Corwin amendment of the Constitu- tion of the United States, which was designed forever to protect slavery in the states against every form of interference by the national gov- ernment. These proceedings marked the end of concession and the beginning of war.
In the House of Representatives, after a delay of two days, the million bill passed by a unan- imous vote. For the time, party lines had disap- peared in the legislature and among the people. The succeeding thirty days of the session were
1 For this chapter the author of the volume is mainly indebted to two or three military friends, Colonel D. W. McClung espe- cially. Their thorough acquaintance with the subject, it is hoped, will give it value.
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devoted to war legislation, and at the adjourn- ment the state was on a war footing. Laws were enacted defining and punishing treason against the state, guarding against the shipment of arms and supplies to rebels, organizing the militia of the state, and regulating war contracts and purchases.
Instead of thirteen regiments assigned to Ohio under the first call for troops, enough volunteers had offered their services before the rush could be arrested to make seventy regiments or more. The legislature authorized the governor to accept ten additional regiments, to be equipped and paid by the state and employed in her defense.
On the morning of April 19th, the first and second regiments, without arms, uniforms, or accoutrements, were dispatched by rail to Wash- ington. The remaining eleven regiments enlisted for the national service were assembled at Camp Dennison, sixteen miles northeast of Cincinnati, which as early as April 20th had been selected by the governor as a camp of instruction. It was soon after accepted by the national authori- ties, and its use was continued in various forms until the close of the war.
As soon, almost, as the work had begun, the state rang with clamorous complaints, most of which grew out of the impatience of a people suddenly thrust out of the ways of peace, and called upon to make preparation for a gigantic war. The complaints which were founded arose from the
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inexperience of officials, and an insatiable de- mand for everything, when nothing was at hand. At the height of the ferment, the House of Rep- resentatives, by resolution, called upon the gov- ernor to dismiss the most important members of his staff for incompetency, though no one sug- gested that it was possible to find more capable or experienced men. As soon as the skill and intelligence of the people had time to rally, order appeared, supplies were found in sufficient quan- tity, their distribution was prompt and effective, and thereafter complaints were rare.
Governor Dennison, setting aside his original preference for Irvin McDowell, appointed George B. McClellan to command the Ohio troops, with the rank of major-general ; and Jacob D. Cox, Joshua H. Bates, and Newton Schleich, brigadiers- general. Within a few days the governor urged the President to appoint General McClellan the ranking major-general of volunteers, saying, “ Ohio must lead throughout the war.” The President responded by appointing him a major- general in the United States army. He soon became commander of a department stretching from the Mississippi to the Alleghany Mountains, then commander of the most important of the national armies, and disappears from the history of the state to become a conspicuous figure in national history.
The position of the state between foreign terri- tory on the north, and four hundred miles of
OHIO IN THE WAR FOR THE UNION . 371
slave territory on the south, caused immediate apprehension for her safety. In both Virginia and Kentucky the people seemed to be drifting into the rebellion, and both states were a menace to Ohio. Governor Dennison’s first care was to guard the frontier. The entire armed militia of the state was stationed so as to be quickly available. At his request the department of General McClel- lan was enlarged so as to include Western Virginia. Early in May, the governor was urging the gen- eral to cross the Ohio River into that position, which, in a military sense, was the “ most offen- sive ” region claimed by the rebellion. But the general manifested his constitutional tendency to extreme caution, and required more men, delay, preparation. On the 20th of May, the rebel forces had reached Grafton. The loyal people of Western Virginia were crying out for protec- tion, and the Secretary of War joined the governor in demanding action. On the 26th of May the Ohio militia was turned over to the general and ordered into Virginia. Within twelve hours after McClellan’s compliance they were in motion. One column entered the state at Parkersburg, the other at Wheeling. The two met at Grafton, and in a few days cleared Western Virginia of hostile forces. That portion of Virginia was never regained by the rebellion, and the south- eastern border of Ohio had rest.
The people of Kentucky, reluctant to join the rebellion, unwilling to support the government,
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stood hesitating while the active secessionists among them pushed their schemes with reckless zeal. The governor’s insolent refusal to furnish troops, and his proclamation of neutrality, which placed the legitimate government on a level with the rebellion for the time, fairly set forth the attitude of the state. It was a mere fortification behind which the enemy could conceal his prep- aration and mask his movements. Governor Dennison insisted that no flaxen theories could long hold in the flames of war, and that the Kentucky problem should be settled at once by the seizure of all the strategic points in the state. The soundness of his judgment was vindicated in both cases : in the one, by the permanent advan- tage from accepting it ; in the other, by the evil consequences of the rejection.
The Ohio regiments, from the 3d to the 13th inclusive, were not sent to the field under their three months’ organization. In May and June they were reorganized by enlistment for three years. As reorganized, they departed for active duty, and on the 9th of July the last of the eleven regiments left the state. The aggregate strength was 10,353 men ; an average of nine hundred and forty-one to a regiment, which re- mained to the end of the war very nearly the average initial strength of the Ohio regiments.
In July the ten regiments of state militia returned from the campaign in Western Virginia. The arrangement to have them mustered and
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paid by the United States government was not carried out, and they dispersed to their homes dissatisfied, to give a serious though temporary check to the volunteer spirit.
On the 22d of July, President Lincoln, re- sponding to the disaster at Bull Run, called for 500,000 volunteers for three years; the quota assigned to Ohio being 67,365, or more than one eighth of the entire army. If the proportion seems unduly large, it is to be explained by the fact that the border states could not then be depended upon, and that the states in rebellion, the territories, and the Pacific slope were never included, then or afterwards, in the basis for military estimates. These portions of the coun- try afterward furnished more than a quarter of a million men.
In Ohio the work of organization was pushed so energetically that at the close of 1861 the governor could report that 77,845 soldiers had enlisted for three years ; that forty-six regiments of infantry, four regiments of cavalry, and twelve batteries of artillery were already in the field; that twenty-two regiments of infantry and four regiments of cavalry were full, or nearly so ; and that thirteen regiments were in progress. This amazing result, achieved within six months after the President’s call, amid the gloom that overspread the land from the disaster of Bull Run, is proof alike of the efficiency of the state authorities and of the resolute patriotism of the people of Ohio.
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Meanwhile Governor Dennison’s staff had been entirely changed, the original members, 'with one exception, having taken commissions in the army, where all of them did honorable service, a fact that seems to call in question the hasty opinion of the House of Representatives. In the new organization, C. P. Buckingham became adjutant- general, Geo. B. Wright quartermaster-general, Columbus Delano commissary-general, and C. P. Walcott judge-advocate-general. All were men of strong character, and efficient in their several stations.
General Buckingham, a man of sound judge- ment, even temper, methodical habits, and purest motives, was one of the few citizens of the state who, like Rosecrans, Whittlesey, and Sill, had the advantage of a thorough military education, and whose services at the outbreak of the war were of inestimable value.
The governor uttered no word of complaint or resentment under the fierce and unjust criti- cism which had fallen upon him, but with un- changed courtliness of manner, calmly wrought, night and day, to bring about the great result that was to save his country and be his own vin- dication. The people were slow to render him justice, because to approve him was to condemn themselves. He was not renominated, partly for the reasons intimated, and also for reasons of party expediency. As he had been a Whig and a Republican, it was deemed expedient to recog-
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nize the large and patriotic element in the Demo- cratic party which had rallied to the support of the government. The nomination was given to David Tod, of Mahoning County, a lifelong Dem- ocrat, a successful man of business, a prominent leader of his party, and a man of strong convic- tions and settled purpose. The opposing candi- date was Hugh J. Jewett. The Democratic party contented itself with the attitude of an opposition to the administration in power. Nevertheless, Tod, who represented an unqualified support of the administration, was elected by a majority of fifty-five thousand. He was inaugurated on the first Monday in January, 1862. He retained the staff of Governor Dennison, as far as possible. Walcott had been appointed assistant secretary of war, and Luther Day was appointed judge- advocate-general. In April, 1862, Buckingham was called to the war department, and Charles W. Hill became adjutant-general.
The regiments remaining in the state were rap- idly mustered and sent to duty. Within three months twenty-seven additional regiments of in- fantry and one of cavalry were turned over to the national government. Since the state had more than filled her quota of troops, recruiting was not at that time urged. But immediately another great work — a work of humanity such as no people ever before performed — enlisted the sympathy and taxed the liberality of the state and her men and women. Until the spring of
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1862 the campaigns had been almost bloodless. The battle of Pittsburgh Landing, with its long list of wounded, and the sudden increase of sick- ness caused by exposure, aroused the people to the necessity for other relief than that afforded by the government. News of the battle reached the state April 9th. Within twenty-four hours three steamboats bearing hospital supplies, physi- cians, and nurses were on their way to the battle- field. This was the beginning of that splendid series of popular efforts to relieve the horrors of war, which was renewed in every emergency and continued to the end.
After each battle there was the same urgency in hurrying to the scene of suffering with special means of relief.
During the year 1862 the state paid more than fifty thousand dollars for steamboats, physicians, and nurses to meet emergencies. The cities of the state out of their treasuries, and the people by private contributions, expended more than an equal amount. About the same time the state authorities inaugurated a system of agents and agencies to give succor to soldiers at all conven- ient points, to communicate important informa- tion, to visit camps and hospitals, and to perform any service that might cheer the soldiers or re- mind them that they were not neglected or for- gotten.
In May of this year, in consequence of an alarm for the safety of the national capital, Gov-
OHIO IN THE WAR FOR THE UNION . 377
ernor Tod called for volunteers to serve for three months. Within three days five thousand assem- bled at Camp Chase, near Columbus. They were hurriedly formed into regiments, three of which were dispatched eastward, and the other two as- signed to guard duty at the Camp Chase prison, relieving an equal number of disciplined troops. The incident is noteworthy as showing the spirit of the people, and the great resources not yet em- ployed.
Under date of July 2d, the second great call for three years’ volunteers was issued, 300,000 men ; the number assigned to Ohio being 36,858. Still her quota was one eighth. Under the call of July 22, 1861, she had furnished 84,116 men, instead of her quota of 67,365, — an excess of 16,751, which had passed to her credit. August 4th another call was issued for 300,000 to serve for nine months, but wisely enough Ohio did not organize a single regiment.
At this time, if not earlier, began the deplor- able error, both in military principle and states- manship, of depending upon volunteer enlist- ments, stimulated, by bounties and threats of a draft, a blunder which worked increasing evil until the close of the war. The earlier calls for volunteers, justified by the great emergency, had hurried to the field, in large measure, the intelli- gent, patriotic, and public-spirited young men. The class who, of all others, are most to be prized were sent to death, while a want of enter-
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prise, or of patriotism, or of courage, became the very means of exemption from bearing the bur- den of citizenship. Though Congress had made all necessary legal provision for a conscription by classes, 46 the uniform and just tax upon the physical strength of a nation,” yet the executive authorities failed to rise to the height of the great argument, and a supreme opportunity was lost.
Thirty-nine additional regiments were pro- jected; the state was divided into districts, one or more regiments assigned to each, and the mili- tary committees in each county were pressed to diligent effort. The draft somehow had assumed the shape of a calamity or a shame, but it was held as a rod over every county and township. Enrolling officers were everywhere busy making lists of all citizens within the military age. Be- fore the end of August, twenty regiments had been sent out of the state, but the quota was not filled. The draft was postponed until October. The threatened invasion of the state by Kirby Smith, and a like menace from Virginia, tended to quicken the work of recruiting.
The evils of the system became more apparent. Aside from the undue burden imposed upon the patriotic, it created new regiments instead of re- inforcing the disciplined and veteran organiza- tions in the field, in which a raw recruit soon became a soldier. The volunteer had a choice of regiments, and he usually chose that one to which
OHIO IN THE WAR FOR THE UNION . 379
he was urged by an officer whose zeal was stimu- lated by a commission contingent upon success in recruiting. The army in the field was likely to become an army on paper. Nevertheless, the state officers did all they could to counteract the tendency, and at the close of the year they esti- mated that nearly twenty-five thousand men had gone to the front to be incorporated with veteran organizations, to become veterans at once.
On the 1st of October it appeared that the enrolled militia of the state numbered 425,147 ; the number of volunteers to September 1st was 151,301, and the draft was ordered for the defi- ciency of 12,251. The result was as might have been expected. Of those drafted more than four thousand, either in person or by substitute, vol- unteered, thus getting their choice of regiments ; nearly three thousand, for one or another reason, were discharged ; nearly two thousand ran away ; and less than twenty-five hundred went to replen- ish the wasted ranks of veteran regiments.
In July of this year, great alarm was caused in Cincinnati by the rapid and almost unopposed movements in central Kentucky, for a period of ten days, of a thousand rebels under John Morgan. The Cincinnati police force, under the command of its chief, with a single piece of artillery, was s£nt against the enemy. The net result was that the disorderly elements in Cincinnati be- came riotous, and the piece of artillery, with its squad, was captured, not, however, without a
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creditable defense. In August and September came the real movement, the occupation of Ken- tucky by the army of General Bragg, one col- umn under Kirby Smith threatening Cincinnati. The danger became fully apparent on Monday, August 31st. The city council of Cincinnati met and pledged the city to meet all necessary ex- pense. The governor issued his proclamation calling for volunteer militia. Martial law was proclaimed on Tuesday, September 1st, and the whole population was put to military duty. A broad pontoon bridge, constructed by using coal barges for floats, was thrown across the Ohio River in one night, and the work of defense was pushed with the utmost vigor. The picturesque, irregular militia from the state came pouring into the city, and continued until turned back five days afterwards by order of the governor. More than fifteen thousand had already assembled in the defense of Cincinnati. On September 5th the enemy appeared, but for military reasons, or be- cause the city was too strongly defended to be taken by hurried assault, they made no attack, and time had been gained for more orderly and systematic resistance. The enemy disappeared September 12th, leaving nothing but an impres- sive warning of the necessity for better state de- fenses.
During the summer and autumn of 1862 there were unmistakable signs that popular enthusiasm had cooled. Outspoken opposition to the war was
OHIO IN THE WAR FOR TEE UNION . 381
not uncommon. A few citizens were arrested by order of Governor Tod and sent to military pris- ons for seditious utterances. At the election held in October, fourteen Congressmen of the Demo- cratic party were chosen, and but five Republicans ; and the Democratic state ticket received a major- ity of nearly six thousand, against a Republican majority the previous year of fifty-five thousand. The Republican vote had fallen off twenty-eight thousand, and the Democratic vote had increased thirty-two thousand. This result may in part be attributed to the withdrawal of voters to recruit the armies, the legislature not having at this time enacted the law giving soldiers in the field the right to vote. The discouraging year of 1862 closed with the appalling disaster at Fredericks- burg. The legislature of the state gave no signs of weakness. The thanks of the state were ten- dered to officers and soldiers who had achieved any success. Laws were enacted to allow the sol- diers to vote, and to secure a better defense of the state. Everything that was done looked toward a vigorous prosecution of the war. Evidences of popular discontent became clearer. Violent re- sistance to the national authority was offered in March, 1863, by citizens of Noble County. In May, C. L. Vallandigham was tried by a military commission and sent across the lines. His arrest was followed by a violent outbreak at Dayton, in which the 44 Journal ” office was sacked and sev- eral buildings burned. In June, further resistance
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to authority broke out in Holmes County. All these disturbances were quickly suppressed, with- out serious conflict or loss of life. That they were contemptible appeared from the ease with which they were suppressed.
Following closely upon these indications of dis- affection, came an invasion of rebel cavalry under John Morgan. They entered the state at Harris son, in Hamilton County, July 13th, and during the following night passed eastward on a line twelve miles north of Cincinnati. On the same day General Judah arrived at Cincinnati by steamboats with his division of cavalry. As General Hobson with a division of cavalry was following Morgan closely, it would have been easy for General Burnside to bring Morgan to battle in Hamilton County. But he purposely avoided forcing a battle in the suburbs of a large city, and waited an opportunity to destroy the invaders without such peril to life and property. In response to the governor’s proclamation, the militia of the state everywhere flew to arms ; but Morgan’s march had become a mere race for safety, and he avoided everything that might cause him delay even for an hour. His line of march lay through the counties of Hamilton, Clermont, Brown, Adams, Pike, Jackson, Vinton, Athens, Gallia, and Meigs. After reaching the hill country beyond the Scioto River, the attacks made by the militia became annoying to him. Fifty thousand men were under arms and eager
OHIO IN TEE WAR FOR TEE UNION. 383
to take part in the hunt. At eight o’clock on the evening of July 18th the fleeing enemy reached Portland, opposite Buffington Island, the point selected for fording the Ohio River. But the ford was defended, the night pitch-dark, and de- lay until morning was necessary.
During the night the commands of both Judah and Hobson came up, the gunboats commanded the ford, and crossing was impossible. The skir- mish known as the battle of Buffington Island was fought, resulting in the capture of seven hun- dred of Morgan’s men and a number of his most important officers. In this skirmish Major Daniel McCook, who accompanied Judah’s command as a volunteer, was killed. He was a paymaster of vol- unteers, past sixty years old, with white hair, but erect, and full of the enthusiasm of youth. He was the father of Generals A. McD. McCook, Robert L. McCook, and Colonel Daniel McCook. This family was not more remarkable for the number of its fighting-men than for the number of its members who fell in the war. Every sum- mer exacted its toll of blood. In July, 1861, the youngest son was killed at Bull Run. Robert was killed in Tennessee in July, 1862; the father fell at Buffington Island in July, 1863 ; and Daniel was mortally wounded at Kennesaw in July, 1864.
The remnant of Morgan’s command turned toward the interior, crossed the Muskingum River above McConnells ville, fled through the counties
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of Morgan, Guernsey, Harrison, and Jefferson, and was finally captured, July 26th, near Salineville in Columbiana. A committee appointed under an act of the legislature passed March 30, 1864, re- ported the losses from the Morgan raid as fol- lows : By acts of the enemy, $428,168 ; by the state and national forces, $148,057: a total of $576,225 inflicted upon the people of the state, — a less amount than the loss by the burning of the single city of Chambersburg.
The political campaign of 1863 in Ohio is memorable not only in the history of the state, but in the history of the war, and almost ranks in importance with the battle of Gettysburg or the capture of Vicksburg. The nomination of Val- landigham, on the 11th of June, was a defiant challenge to the war sentiment of the state, and nothing more was wanting to force a campaign of unwonted heat and bitterness. As the adminis- tration of Governor Tod had been efficient and fairly popular, his renomination had been ex- pected ; but while the Democratic convention with furious enthusiasm was nominating Vallandigham, John Brough was addressing a mass meeting at Marietta, in a speech of great force, in favor of a determined and relentless prosecution of the war. In years past he had been a powerful Democratic leader. He was widely known for his integrity and ability in public affairs, and, having been out of politics for fifteen years, was free from the jealousies and animosities which gather about an
OHIO IN THE WAR FOR THE UNION . 385
active public career. He at once became a popu- lar favorite, and when the Republican convention met, June 17th, he had a handsome majority of the delegates. The convention declared for the prosecution of the war, and refused to consider any other question. Within three weeks after these nominations, the victories at Gettysburg, Vicksburg, and Helena had carried the war past the critical point. The nation watched the con- test in Ohio with intense interest. The result was a surprise to all. Brough had a majority in the home vote of 61,920 and in the soldier vote of 39,179, or a total of 101,099. The magnitude of the vote was no less suggestive. The Democratic vote had increased over the vote of the previous year by more than three thousand, and the Re- publican vote had increased almost 110,000, a total increase of 113,000. Probably not one half the soldiers voted, and yet the total vote of 475,868 was many thousands larger than any pre- vious poll, and was not again equalled until the election of 1867.
During the winter of 1863-64 the reenlistment of veterans took place. Since their term had be- gun in 1861, it would end in 1864. More than 20,000 of them again responded to their country’s call and enlisted for the war. Each veteran regi- ment was granted a furlough for thirty days as soon as reorganized. Returning to their homes in every part of the state, they became the heroes of the hour. Their example shamed the lag-
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gards, encouraged the hopeful, and stimulated volunteering.
From the outbreak of the war, the want of an efficient military organization had been severely felt, but the immediate demand for men in the national armies had absorbed every energy of the state authorities. At the session of January, 1863, a law was enacted requiring the organization of the entire militia of the state, to be known as the Ohio Militia, with another and more select or- ganization, to be armed, equipped, and made ready for military duty, to be called the Ohio Volunteer Militia. At the close of Governor Tod’s adminis- tration, the organized militia numbered 167,572, and the volunteer militia 43,930. In addition to the time given to drill, these volunteers had borne the expense of their own uniforms, at a cost of nearly $350,000. The retiring governor had the satisfaction of reporting that the state stood armed for her own defense, and had com- plied with every demand of the national govern- ment, having furnished 200,671 men.
Governor Brough was inaugurated January 11, 1864. In his address he discussed but one theme, and interpreted the recent election as merely the expression of the people not to “ negotiate with rebels in arms, or admit anything from them but unconditional surrender and submission.” He urgently recommended a more liberal public pro- vision for the families of soldiers. He deprecated the dependence upon private charity as placing
OHIO IN THE WAR FOR THE UNION. 387
an undue burden upon the liberal and patriotic, not honorable to the state, and offensive and hu- miliating to the soldiers. A law enacted in 1862 had required a levy of three fourths of a mill in the dollar for this purpose. The governor recom- mended three mills, and expressed his personal preference for a levy of four mills. The legisla- ture, more cautious than the governor, fixed it at two mills, with power to the county commission- ers to increase to three mills, and to city councils to add another half mill. As the assessed value of taxable property for 1864 was slightly in excess of one thousand million dollars, it will be seen that the state was not giving relief with a niggard hand. With increased needs, private liberality also increased. It is not possible to state the amount thus freely contributed ; for charity vaunteth not itself. However, a few or- ganizations for distributing the gifts of the people necessarily kept records and rendered accounts. Chief among these were the Cincinnati and Cleve- land branches of the United States Sanitary Com- mission, which reported cash contributions of nearly a half million dollars, and supplies to a much larger amount. So generally was the vast work of receiving and distributing done gra- tuitously, that but one and a half per cent, of the contributions was expended between the giver and the receiver. Such a result was possible only be- cause the telegraph lines and all common carriers were free to the use of the Sanitary Commission,
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and many of the agents of the state gave their services without compensation. Soldiers’ Homes were maintained at Cincinnati, Columbus, and Cleveland, where more than two hundred thou- sand soldiers, first and last, were comfortably lodged and fed. The work of relief was not dis- continued until the refluent waves of war had set- tled to the calm level of peace. Nor was the work limited to Ohio soldiers. It embraced impartially all who served their country, and even her sick and wounded enemies. It was not a ministry for the state, but for a cause, and for humanity.
The governor, by personal attention and through the various executive agencies, supervised and en- forced the proper use of relief funds raised by taxation, not neglecting, however, the application of the people’s voluntary gifts. From the first it was evident that he was to impress his powerful personality upon the history of the state. In- tensely in earnest, and of surpassing powers of endurance, he was unsparing of himself and of others. Indifferent to criticism and even abuse, he could not understand the sensitiveness which shrinks from savage reproof, or flames into indig- nation at blunt and unqualified denunciation. With a mind at once quick and comprehensive, and endowed with dauntless courage, he rarely failed to detect an error, never avoided a collision, and always spoke without refinement of phrase, or “ meal in the mouth.” In his public duties, Robert Morris was not more disinterested, Samuel Adams was not more zealous.
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The system of recruiting by volunteers and bounties, with the draft held as a threat, con- tinued with swiftly increasing evils. Governor Brough denounced it as a confession of weakness discreditable to the government, as an appeal to cupidity and not to patriotism, and warned the authorities and the public that enormous local debts were thereby growing up, to be a burden if paid, and a shame and calamity if repudiated. “The state swarmed with bounty-jumpers, boun- ty-brokers, and mercenaries of every description,” and while the real soldiers received no propor- tionate assistance from all this profligate expen- diture, their noble service was discredited by enforced association with disreputable methods and hireling comrades. But other states held to volunteering, the draft had been rendered unpopu- lar, and the authorities at Washington were re- luctant to apply force. The governor gained nothing by his vigorous effort except the vindi- cation of his own courage and judgment.
With a view to ending this ruinous drain upon the people, Governor Brough devised the plan for adding a large reinforcement to the armies during the critical period of the campaign of 1864. At the beginning of his administration, measures had been taken to secure a more efficient organ- ization of the militia. A bill drafted by Adju- tant-General Cowen, with the assistance of Colo- nels L. A. Harris and John M. Connell, was promptly passed by the general assembly. The
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name of the Volunteer Militia was changed to the “ National Guard,” and ample provision was made for all the necessary expenses of that or- ganization by the collection of a commutation fee of four dollars per annum from each citizen of the state who was subject to military duty, and not a member of the guard or in the military ser- vice of the United States. The law went into effect immediately, and in a very short time the National Guard of Ohio became the best or most efficient military organization that any state pos- sessed. This was soon demonstrated.
Upon Governor Brough’s invitation, a confer- ence of governors was held at Washington, and at its close, on the 21st of April, a tender signed by the governors of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa was made to the President, offering 85,000 soldiers for one hundred days’ service; Ohio to furnish 30,000, Indiana and Illinois 20,000 each, Iowa 10,000, and Wisconsin 5,000. The offer was accepted April 23d, and on the same day Governor Brough telegraphed Adjutant-General B. R. Co wen to issue the necessary orders and put the machinery in motion. The adjutant- general was distinguished for executive ability, calm judgment, and resolute purpose. The order appeared in all the daily newspapers Monday morning, April 25th, commanding the National Guard to assemble May 2d, the place of rendez- vous for each regiment to be fixed by the com- mander.
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Notwithstanding the time appointed was the opening season of business, particularly of agri« cultural activity, the adjutant-general, on the second day of May, at six o’clock P. M., astounded the War Department with the despatch, “ More than thirty thousand National Guards are in camp, ready for muster ; ” and at half past seven o’clock the reports from regimental commanders showed more than thirty-eight thousand. The War Department was taken aback, no adequate arrangements having been made for mustering such a multitude. Many members of these regi- ments had already entered the military service, and some organizations were thus reduced below the minimum, making consolidation necessary. All difficulties, however, were overcome, and on the 18th of May Governor Brough telegraphed the Secretary of War : “Ohio has sent four regi- ments to Baltimore, two to Cumberland, thirteen to Washington and a fourteenth to leave to-night, three to Parkersburgh, four to Charleston, three to New Creek, three to Harper’s Ferry ; has sta- tioned one regiment at Gallipolis, two at Camp Dennison, two at Camp Chase, and two regiments and a battery at Johnson’s Island, being forty regiments and one battalion.” The whole work had been done within sixteen days.
The service performed by these regiments was not nominal. They guarded the prisons at John- son’s Island and Camp Chase, protected the Bal- timore and Ohio Railroad, held the gateway to
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western Virginia, and occupied the defenses of Baltimore and Washington. They formed the bulk of the army with which General Lew Wal- lace stubbornly resisted Early’s advance upon the national capital. Some of them served in the campaign in the Shenandoah valley against Jubal Early, and others were at 44 the front ” along the James River. Their losses were heavy, and some of them starved and died at Andersonville. For the time, they took the place of the same number of veteran troops.
During his administration Governor Tod had made promotions without any fixed rule, some- times by seniority, sometimes disregarding rank in deference to supposed fitness. Characteristi- cally, Governor Brough, by an order issued Feb- ruary 6, 1864, announced that all promotions would be by seniority in rank, except when drunkenness was proved ; that opinions of com- manding officers would not be regarded ; and that incompetency and inefficiency must be dealt with, not by tolerating them in subordinate posi- tions, but by driving them out of the army. His theory seemed to be, that if an officer was good enough to remain in the service he was good enough to receive promotion in due order, and if not fit for promotion he was not fit to remain in the army. The rule was distasteful to regimental commands, and led to much acrimonious corre- spondence.
The governor, with his accustomed energy and
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fearlessness, and often with utter disregard of military order and discipline, hunted out and rep- rimanded shirks, with but little care for their feel- ings. His agents were everywhere, and he gave ready ear to complaints that came from them or from private soldiers, a practice that easily de- generated into meddling, and led to insubordi- nation. In a few months he was engaged in a widespread controversy with army officers. They often were violent and disrespectful, and he never failed to hold his own in the vigor and asperity of his replies. He failed to see the distinction be- tween the state and the United States service, and, unmindful that no man can serve two mas- ters, insisted that every Ohio soldier was under his paternal care, and that every volunteer officer from his state was at all times liable to be called to account to him. As a necessary consequence, almost the entire army influence was leagued against him in a common quarrel. Some officers were dismissed from the service for disrespect shown him, for he was not a man in any wise to be rashly attacked or resisted. There was no way, however, for his enemies to reach him but to wait for his halting, which never came, or to thwart his ambition, for which no opportunity was given ; for he had declined a renomination, and died on the 29th of August, 1865, half a year before his term expired. He was succeeded by Lieutenant-Governor Charles Anderson. Six weeks after the death of Governor Brough, Major-
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General Jacob D. Cox, the most distinguished Ohio soldier who went into the war without mili- tary education or experience, was nominated as governor.
In another campaign, had Governor Brough survived, the discontent and altercations between him and the officers in the field would probably have forced the national government to take the organization of state troops generally into their own hands. These and similar misconceptions in other states, and the great mischief, not to say danger, incurred by the service, all point to the importance of speedy legislation by Congress, while experienced officers are living to aid in framing it, by which the militia of the states shall be organized, trained, and disciplined under the general and uniform system contemplated and provided for in the Constitution and in time of peace. Fortifications are not more important, either for war or insurrection. By such forecast the United States will not again be subjected to a waste of hundreds of millions of dollars in ex- temporizing a hasty system out of nothing.
Prior to January 1, 1864, the Ohio infantry regiments, from the 1st to the 128th, and all the cavalry and artillery organizations, had been sent to the field. All these, as well as the recruits from time to time sent to repair the waste of war, were enlisted for three years. The regiments from the 130th to the 172d, inclusive, were the one hun- dred days’ reinforcement, made up of the National
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Guard. Those from the 173d to the 197th were enlisted for one year, in 1864 and early in 1865, when it was expected that the rebellion would soon be subdued. Eleven of these regiments, from the 173d to 183d, were completed during 1864, and the others were rapidly filled up early in 1865. It had been confidently expected that the campaign of 1864 would end the war, but the country was amazed at the tenacity of the enemy after it was evident that no rational hope of suc- cess remained. The work of recruiting went steadily on, the last regiment having left the state a week after the surrender at Appomattox.
In August, 1864, the governor, in announcing arrangements for the second draft, had startled the public with a serious warning not to engage in any attempt at forcible resistance. Through detectives he had discovered a secret, oath-bound society, akin to the “ Knights of the Golden Cir- cle,” which had been the controlling power in dragging some of the states into rebellion. As stated in the report of the adjutant-general, it numbered from eighty to one hundred and ten thousand members. It is not to be credited that such a number of citizens were consciously plot- ting rebellion and bloodshed. The vast majority, doubtless, were dupes, led into lodges through ignorance, or party zeal, or a desire for novelty. The authorities, however, took efficient precau- tions, and before the time fixed for the draft the National Guards returned to their homes, all bear-
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ing their arms, and all in a spirit not lightly to be ruffled. Not a ripple disturbed the surface of society where the draft took place.
In this limited sketch no attempt can be made to trace the career of Ohio officers and soldiers beyond the confines of the state. On their entry into the national service they ceased to belong to Ohio. But it belongs to the history of the state to say that the most distinguished officers of the army were of Ohio birth or training, or both. The list includes Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, Mc- Pherson, Buell, Rosecrans, McDowell, Gilmore, Cox, besides many distinguished commanders of divisions and army corps. Ohio was hardly less conspicuous in the councils of the nation. She gave three members to the cabinet. In the Sen- ate, Wade and Sherman were second to none in courage and position as statesmen. In the House of Representatives were Bingham, Shellabarger, Ashley, Schenck, Garfield, and Horton on the side of the administration ; and Pendleton, S. S. Cox, and Vallandigham in the opposition : no state pre- sented a stronger array than this. No better proof could be added of the worth of the pioneer stock of Ohio than that so many of their sons rose to leadership in the great crisis of the country’s history. It is proof not only of inherited quali- ties, but of conscientious family training, the best characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon race.
These distinguished leaders were exponents of a people of like character and training, who gave
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them prominence and sustained them by suffrage and sacrifice. In the unnamed mass, incapable of being singled out because of their numbers, there were also heroes and leaders. They it was who filled the ranks of the army, and kept their state a creditor and never a debtor upon any demand for men. It was they who moved in continuous column to the front until the rebellion was sup- pressed. They were called upon for 306,322 men ; they responded with 319,659, and furnished more than a tenth of the entire army that vindicated the national power.
Ohio and her authorities, legislative and execu- tive, kept pace with events throughout the war. The whole power of the state was at all times exerted to sustain the government. She exhibited no provincial jealousies or quibbles, and higgled at no price. She stood upon no constitutional precedents or refinements. Her motto was, Sup- pression of the rebellion first, everything else afterward. In giving her soldiers the right to participate in the elections while absent in the field, she allowed the utmost stretch of law, and indeed exceeded the line of safety, but it was that they might feel they were still her sons. Her pro- vision for their families, also, was bountiful. She established soldiers’ homes. Her agents were in every hospital, in every army and camp. They distributed her bounty ; they acted in lieu of banks of exchange in sending the soldier’s pay to his family ; they watched for his coming at every available point.
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Her soldiers formed part of every army, marched in every campaign, fought in every im- portant battle from Bull Run to Bentonville, from Sabine Cross Roads to Gettysburg. Twenty-nine regiments and ten batteries were at the siege and capture of Vicksburg. Thirty-five regiments of infantry, three of cavalry, and seven batteries of artillery were in the Army of the Cumberland when it fought its way from Stone River to At- lanta. Nine regiments of infantry, two of cav- alry, and a battery of artillery marched and fought under Sheridan in the Shenandoah valley. Forty-five regiments of infantry and two batteries of artillery were with Sherman in the Carolinas. Thirty-two regiments of infantry, seven batteries of artillery, and a regiment of cavalry helped at Nashville to finish the rebellion in the Missis- sippi valley. Forty-three of her regiments of infantry stormed Missionary Ridge. Twelve regi- ments of infantry, one of cavalry, and four bat- teries of artillery were on the decisive field of Gettysburg, and fifteen of her veteran regiments were in the army that assembled in Texas, after the collapse of the rebellion, for the ostensible purpose of admonishing a refractory people, but really to expedite the departure of the French intruders from Mexico.
The alacrity of the soldiers, and the energy of the authorities, in the final disbanding of the great army, has excited the wonder of the world. Before the close of the year of the total sur-
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render, all but eight of the Ohio organizations had disappeared. In June and July, 1866, the 25th Infantry, Battery B of the First Artillery, and the 11th Cavalry, were mustered out of the service, the last of Ohio’s volunteer army.
Exact numbers in stating the loss of 'life in the war will never be obtained, but approxima- tions may now be made. Of the soldiers of Ohio, twelve thousand were killed or mortally wounded, one half left dead on the battlefield. According to the usual ratio, at least forty thou- sand must have received wounds in action. Over thirteen thousand died of disease in the service, and more than twenty thousand were discharged on account of disability.
During the entire war the orderly movements of society were not interrupted, and, consider- ing the withdrawal of so much available labor, the disturbance of productive industries was sur- prisingly small. There was a diminution of the acreage under cultivation, and of the produce of agriculture, but not at all in proportion to the numbers of laborers withdrawn to war. The product of manufacturing industries did not di- minish even during the years of war, and during that decade it was doubled, showing the same proportional increase as during the previous de- cade. The increased population and the applica- tion of improved machinery had made up for the labor subtracted.
The public schools went on as regularly as in
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times of peace. The churches continued their service of worship and moral training, and power- fully aided in the great work. The courts held their sessions uninterruptedly. Less than twenty arbitrary arrests under extreme provocation sum up the departure from that due process of law which is so dear and vital to a free people. The colleges and institutions of higher learning, though depleted by their contribution of teach- ers and students to the army, kept open their doors and carried forward their work term by term. All this, with the sacrifices made for a great cause, the concern felt for those afar off, and the remote consequences, the habitual con- templation and discussion of these great interests and themes, added depth and seriousness to the character of the people, that will be felt far into the future.
CHAPTER XV.
OHIO SINCE THE CIVIL WAR.
The history of Ohio since the close of the Civil War has been that of a profound economic and social transformation difficult to conceive and still more difficult to describe except through the medium of bare statistics. In the first place the population, which in 1860 numbered 2,839,511, and covered the area of the state with a moderate density of 57 to the square mile, had increased by 1900 to 4,157,545, and raised the density of settle- ment to 102 to the mile. This alone meant a greater concentration in living, and entailed all the consequences of increased demands for land, for food and building materials, and for transpor- tation. But mere increase in numbers was not the only cause of change, for the four millions of 1900 made their living in ways very different from those which prevailed forty years before. In the Ohio of 1860 agriculture was the great source of individual wealth, and grazing and wool growing came next; but in the Ohio of 1900 manufactures and mining overshadowed agricul- ture, steam and electric railways had invaded every corner of the state, and cities blackened
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the air of nearly every county with their smoke. The typical “ farmer” state of 1860 had become one of the leading industrial communities in North America. This mighty change seemed to pro- gress visibly during the periods of prosperity ; then, with financial depression, as in 1873-77 or 1893-96, to move more sluggishly; but whether fast or slow there was no turning back ; by the census of 1900 it had become evident that the Ohio of the first half century was a vanished com- munity.
In 1860 Ohio stood second in the amount of cereals raised, second in horses and cattle, and first in wool. Manufactures at that time em- ployed only 75,000 men, in a total of 11,000 estab- lishments with a capital of 57 millions, and most of these were limited to local and domestic mar- kets. Cities were small, there being only six with over 8000 population, only three over 20,000, and only one, Cincinnati, over 100,000. In a popula- tion of two and a third millions only one ninth lived in cities ; the farmer was the typical figure, dominating society and politics.
The decade containing the Civil War saw the beginning of the great change. In those years railways began to be pushed across the state with vigor, until by 1871 over three thousand miles were constructed. Simultaneously and partly as a result of the railway extension the coal meas- ures of the eastern parts of the state began to be opened up ; the iron of Pennsylvania, and later
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of Lake Superior, began to be brought to meet the Ohio coal ; and iron and steel manufacturing spread from city to city. All other manufactures felt the stimulus and rushed into production, the number of establishments doubling in a decade, the employees rising to 137,000, and the value of the output more than doubling. In the panic of 1873, this first over-enthusiastic rush of Ohio capital into railways and manufactures paid the penalty of too great optimism and too little cau- tion. In that fatal year and during a long period of subsequent “ hard times ” railway earnings de- creased, until bankruptcies followed, manufactures were idle or failed, and it seemed as if all industry had come to an indefinite suspension of activity. But from this relapse Ohio rose again with vigor in the years after 1878, and although hindered by another epoch of financial stringency after 1893, did not cease its progress nor experience any severe mishaps. Railways, coal, and iron gave the direction of development throughout.
A picturesque episode in the steady industrial development of the state came about in 1885 to 1888 through the dramatic discovery of natural gas in Hancock and Allen counties, which created a temporary craze for its use as fuel and led to the discovery of other supplies in many localities in western and central Ohio. For a time the apparently inexhaustible quantities of gas, and its free donation by enthusiastic and shortsighted municipalities to manufacturing plants, led to the
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mushroom growth of cities in gas districts; but the rapid diminution of the gas supply after a brief ten years of activity showed that the new fuel was not destined to supplant coal or petroleum, and except for lighting and heating purposes its use was generally abandoned by the end of the cen- tury. The real prosperity of Ohio’s manufactures rested on the coal measures.
By the opening of the twentieth century Ohio had become one of the leading manufacturing states in the Union, fifth as to the total value of its output, fourth in boots and shoes, second in iron and steel, first in clay products. Ohio manu- factures were sent over the United States and exported through the civilized and uncivilized world. Over nine thousand miles of railway cov- ered the state like a network, carrying the coal of the southeastern regions to every corner, and gathering the products of every city or solitary factor y. The 75,000 employees of 1860 had in- creased to 345,000 in 1900, and the proportion of persons engaged in trade, transportation, and manufactures had grown from one third to nearly one half of the total number engaged in remu- nerative pursuits.
By the side of this great industrial development agriculture failed to hold its own. The staple crops, it is true, increased enormously, more than doubling in every branch since 1860 ; but while they doubled, manufactures had increased seven- fold, and in addition new agricultural and grazing
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states had been opened up in the West which challenged Ohio’s prominence. By 1900 Ohio was no longer second, but seventh, as a grain- producing state. Cattle-raising showed still more clearly the altered economic interests, for although for a time after the war flocks and herds contin- ued to increase, there came sooner or later for all of them a stationary period and then retro- gression. The sheep of 1900 were not so numer- ous as the sheep of 1870, the cattle, horses, and swine of 1900 showed a decline from ten years before, and wool, once the great staple of Ohio prosperity, fell off in quantity almost year by year. The competition of the extreme West and the new states of the plains, and the increasing returns from manufactures, had had their effect ; the proportion of persons engaged in agriculture fell from 36 per cent, to 26 per cent. Ohio was no longer a farmer state.
The change in industrial interests showed itself unmistakably in the distribution of population. Of the two and a third millions of 1860 scarcely one ninth lived in cities, a lower proportion than held good in the United States as a whole; but of the four and a sixth millions of 1900 nearly two fifths were urban, a considerably higher pro- portion than the country at large had reached. In place of six cities only, with more than 8000 population, there were thirty-eight ; in place of one over 100,000 there were four, and two of these, Cleveland and Cincinnati, were seventh and tenth
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respectively among the cities of the land. Every- where near mines, near points of railway concen- tration, near harbors on the shore of Lake Erie, — in all places where coal and iron could be brought together, cities had sprung up, crowded with fac- tories black with soot and buzzing with machin- ery. On the other hand, the censuses from 1880 onward showed that while the state grew steadily in population, the corn-growing and sheep-raising counties stood still or declined. Their noon was past. Henceforward Ohio showed the same marks of economic maturity as her older sisters to the eastward, and looked forward to the twentieth century as destined to add continually to her wealth through manufacturing rather than agri- cultural growth.
The real history of Ohio is to be sought in the field of business, of manufactures, and of railways, for beside their great development the politics or public life of the state has been of slight moment. The interests of the men of the era since the Civil War have been mainly engrossed with the won- derful industrial expansion, and public affairs have had to adjust themselves to the altered situation. Govern mentally the history of the state is con- servative beyond precedent, since the Constitution of 1851, drawn up for a race of farmers, continued in operation throughout the century, — one of the very few in the country to exist for so long a time. In 1873-74 a constitutional convention, — led by many of Ohio’s ablest and most practical men,
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labored with great thoroughness to perfect a more modern instrument; but the conservative voters in the ill-temper of the year of hard times, 1874, rejected the draft by an overwhelming majority. Of amendments since attempted nearly all have failed, owing to the provision requiring a majority of votes cast at the election to secure ratification, the result being that the neglect to register an opinion was equivalent to a negative vote.
The conduct of the state administration has been of a similarly conservative character. The Civil War debt was reduced steadily to a merely nominal sum, and the receipts and expenses, in spite of the great growth of the state in wealth, have been steadily kept below the Civil War figures, except when another war in 1898 caused a temporary increase. While school and univer- sity funds have been maintained and enlarged, new fields of expenditure have not been sought, the policy of the state, in good democratic fashion, having been to leave them for the local units. Nor have these, it must be admitted, been slow to occupy the field, for local indebtedness, which as early as 1872 stood at 20 millions, had surpassed 50 millions thirty years later. At the height of the railway craze preceding the panic of 1873, the legislature passed an act authorizing counties and municipalities to build and operate railways, under whose terms no less than ninety towns bonded themselves for that purpose. The supreme court, however, intervened to declare the act un-
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constitutional, thereby preventing a reckless spec- ulation.
Legislation during the two generations after the Civil War centred about industrial and eco- nomic matters. Every session of the legislature — annual until 1895, but since then biennial, in tardy fulfillment of the purpose of the constitution of 1851 — was productive of bills concerning cor- porations, imposing restrictions and defining pow- ers, and of acts adding to the supervisory and administrative powers of state and local officials. The existence of state commissioners of railways and telegraphs and of insurance, state inspectors of building and loan associations, of mines, of factories, of oils, and of foods, boards of examiners for medical, veterinary, and dental registration testified to the extent to which the state has been driven slowly to recognize new problems. The other interests of the state received increased attention with the increasing population and the growing complexity of modern industrial life. Asylums, hospitals, and penal institutions were subjects of continual legislation, hardly a session passed without alterations in the school laws, and during the whole of this period the amount of special municipal legislation grew in bulk year by year. The provision of the constitution for- bidding special laws for municipal corporations was evaded by applying a system of classification which was subjected to continual subdivisions, until in its last estate nearly every one of the
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larger cities of the state was the sole occupant of a class or grade, and hence the sole beneficiary of “ general ” legislation for that grade. This trans- parent device permitted unlimited legislative in- terference with city charters, offices, powers, and finances ; but the whole scheme received a death- blow when in 1902 the state supreme court, nerving itself to reverse a long line of previous decisions, declared the classification system uncon- stitutional and forced the legislature to enact a general code, applicable in the words of the consti- tution to “ cities and incorporated villages,” and restricting “ their power of taxation, assessment, borrowing money, contracting debts, and loaning their credit, so as to prevent the abuse of such power.”
The action of the supreme court in this affair illustrates the general tendency in judicial history since the Civil War. For twenty years the Ohio judiciary adhered to a broad construction of the constitution and abstained as far as possible from decisions adverse to the validity of laws. Their atti- tude is shown by a case in 1877, when the supreme court practically disclaimed the power to decide whether an act was or was not local in character, holding that the legislature, confined by the con- stitution to general laws, was itself the judge as to whether any law it passed was general or not. But in the last fifteen years of the century a dif- ferent spirit appeared ; the court began to construe more strictly the provisions of the constitution,
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and as a consequence to invalidate laws with con- siderable frequence. This involved the reversal of previous decisions, but the court did not flinch. In 1887, for instance, it asserted its right and duty, heretofore disclaimed, to declare a law in- valid if not passed in due constitutional form. In 1896 it reasserted its right to judge of the general or local character of a law by its contents, upsetting a series of previous precedents, and in 1902, as has been mentioned, it struck down the whole system of municipal legislation. In 1895 and 1896 it even went so far as to declare laws void on the ground that they violated, not some specific clause of the constitution, but its general spirit. This increasing rigor of the Ohio judiciary failed to evoke any public disapproval, but tended rather to call forth applause ; for it fell in with the growing popular desire to restrict legislation, and the increasing popular impatience with legislative interference with business. The court stood for- ward at the century’s end as never before in the character of guardian of the fundamental law.
The large number of statutes overthrown by judicial decisions certainly indicates a reckless quality in Ohio legislation during the years suc- ceeding the Civil War. Ohio law-making showed the same features as did that of other states, — an honest endeavor, in the main, to deal with new problems, hampered by a great deal of inexperience and shortsightedness on the part of the legislators, and varied by occasional jobbery and frequent
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rank political partisanship. On the whole, how- ever, the legislative and governmental activity of the state was not the subject of political contests or political interests. The votes and debates on nearly all measures have been without regard to party.
This situation did not prevent Ohio from be- ing preeminent in the Union for the keenness of its party feeling and the warmth of its electoral struggles. This was due to several facts. In the first place the position of Ohio was such as to give it an importance in national politics since the Civil War equaled by scarcely any other state in the country. Not only did the numbers of its population give it weight in the electoral college, but its character, at once agricultural and in- creasingly industrial, made it the easternmost of the Western states and placed it at the meeting point of the political tendencies of the agricultural West and the manufacturing East. Further, the accidental fact that Ohio held its state election for governor the year before the presidential elec- tion, and in the presidential year cast its ballots for minor state offices in October, one month before the federal election, raised it to the im- portance of a political weather-gauge. The vote in Ohio was supposed to indicate conclusively the tendencies in the Union at large, and the result was that the two great political parties concen- trated their efforts upon the Ohio elections to an unequaled degree. After twenty years of this
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extreme pressure the voters of the state sought relief by changing the election day to November, but although the state fortunately lost the charac- ter of weather-gauge its real political weight was undiminished.
The result of this political prominence has been the existence of two very bitterly opposed party organizations in the state, struggling at every election with never fading rancor. For about eighteen years, from 1865 to 1893, their relations remained fairly constant. The Republicans con- trolled the larger maximum vote, and in presi- dential elections could be reasonably sure of suc- cess ; but the Democrats, in 44 off years ” or on local issues, ran a chance of occasionally electing gov- ernors, carrying legislatures, and choosing United States senators. During these eighteen years the Democratic party was a 64 hard times party,” al- most invariably winning in years of depression, as 1873, 1874, 1877, 1883, and 1889, and as inva- riably being decisively beaten in years of agricul- tural and industrial prosperity. During the entire period the party representing the aspirations of a farming community manifested a tendency to de- nounce capitalists and to advocate currency expan- sion. From 1868 to 1876 its demand for paper money and taxation of government bonds was so consistent that the inflation movement was com- monly known as 44 the Ohio idea.” After that the party became an adherent first of bimetallism and later of free silver coinage, a position it main-
OHIO SINCE THE CIVIL WAR .
413
tained into the twentieth century. The Republi- cans, no less dependent at first upon an agricul- tural constituency, but at the same time bound by the ties of party to a conservative Eastern wing, showed a tendency to vacillate and advocate half- way measures ; but while anxious at all times to attract inflationist votes, they remained always more cautious than their Democratic rivals. On the tariff both parties occupied for years a moder- ate position, the Democrats advocating low duties, the Republicans a revenue tariff with incidental protection. Later, as the manufacturing interests of the state grew into importance, the Republi- cans became more decided in favor of protection, and at the same time appealed for rural support by a vigorous advocacy of high duties on wool. Finally, in the last decade of the century the two parties came to join issue squarely, the Democrats adhering to their demands for free coinage and a low tariff, while the Republicans, shifting with the altered interests of the state, grew steadily firmer in opposition to silver inflation and increasingly vigorous in advocacy of protection. The results of this change showed that the new economic devel- opment of the state had worked to the profit of the Republicans. The Democrats, beaten in 1893 during a panic year, failed to recover as on pre- vious occasions, and steadily remained for the next ten years in a hopeless minority. The indus- trial development of Ohio had apparently brought about a permanent change in the balance of politi- cal parties.
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The importance of Ohio in the electoral college, and its character as Western state and political weather-gauge, led the Republican party to nomi- nate presidential candidates with a special view to gaining the Ohio vote by calling forth state pride, — the upshot being that Ohio contributed, after the Civil War, no less than five presidents. Grant and Harrison were born in Ohio, although not residents of the state at the time of their elec- tion, and Hayes, Garfield, and McKinley were ac- tive political leaders there. In fact, Ohio seemed to have taken the place once held by Virginia as the “ mother of presidents.’’ But Ohio’s place in federal politics was by no means a mere accident of locality and population, for no state furnished a greater number of real political leaders during the years after the Civil War, men whose actual abilities made them prominent in Senate, House, Cabinet, and judiciary. To mention only the few most eminent names, there were among Republi- can senators Wade and Sherman, both men of the first order, the latter having served also with bril- liant success as Secretary of the Treasury, and among the Democratic Senators, Thurman and Pendleton. In the House of Representatives, it is enough to name Garfield and McKinley, each of whom, after long service, attained the presi- dency. In the Cabinet a long list of able men, from Stanton, Secretary of War during the Recon- struction period, and Cox in Grant’s first Cabinet, to W. R. Day, Secretary of State at the end of
OHIO SINCE THE CIVIL WAR.
415
the century, showed the political weight of Ohio, while in the Supreme Court three associate jus- tices and two chief justices, Chase and Waite, indicated Ohio’s impress on the judicial depart- ment. With such men as these guiding national affairs it is not too much to say that the real politi- cal history of Ohio is to be sought in the domain of the federal government since the Civil War.
Owing to the predominance of national or purely partisan issues, the details of party fluctuations in Ohio are not a vital part of the development of the state. Bitter as party feeling was it seldom concerned state policy as such, but centred on matters connected with federal politics. In 1867, for instance, in the height of the Reconstruction struggle, the Democrats carried the legislature, rejected the fifteenth amendment, and attempted to rescind the ratification by the state of the fourteenth amendment. In the bitterness of the contest, they also tried to mark their opposition to negro suffrage by passing the famous “ visible admixture ” law, designed to render impossible the voting of mulattoes in Ohio, but this was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court and re- pealed by the next legislature. Another frequent source of angry struggles was the districting of the state for congressional elections. Each party passed acts, or repealed acts passed by the other party, with the express purpose of “ gerrymander- ing” the state, on several occasions. At times the senatorial elections also resulted in partisan
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wrangling. In 1886, the Republicans, who con- trolled the House, unseated ten Democrats, which led the Democrats, who held a precarious majority in the Senate, and felt their chances uncertain, to attempt the device of preventing an election by breaking a quorum. The Democratic senators not only left the Capitol, but abandoned the state, hoping in this way to block all action, but the Republican senators admitted four contestants, secured a quorum, and triumphantly reelected Sherman.
Apart from such struggles, arising from the con- nection of state with national politics, the princi- pal local issue which has disturbed Ohio has been the temperance question. In 1874 this suddenly assumed importance through the outbreak of a woman’s crusade, carried on vigorously by singing and praying, for a number of months, until the impetus finally wore out. From this time a steady growth developed, principally in the country dis- tricts, of sentiment favorable to the enactment of prohibitory or restrictive laws. In 1882 the matter became a party issue through the action of a Re- publican legislature in passing a liquor tax act. This was declared unconstitutional the same year, but the German vote in alarm swung to the Demo- cratic side. The next year the legislature enacted the “ Scott law,” intended to regulate liquor-sell- ing and bring in a revenue. This was at first held constitutional by the court, but in 1884 it was declared partly unconstitutional, leaving the
OHIO SINCE THE CIVIL WAR.
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Republican programme in confusion. The De- mocrats had profited by the situation to carry the legislature in 1883, and for two years no legisla- tion was attempted. In 1885, however, the “ Scott law ” having been finally wiped out by the courts, the two parties divided squarely on the liquor ques- tion, the Republicans adhering to a tax scheme, the Democrats calling for a constitutional amend- ment, — notoriously difficult of attainment, — but this time the Republicans won, passed the “ Dow law,” which ran the gauntlet of the courts in safety, and so ended the controversy.
Party struggles were obscured when, at the cen- tury’s end, Ohio was called upon for the first time in two generations to contribute men for the de- fense of the country. When President McKinley issued his call for volunteers in the war with Spain, on April 25, 1898, the National Guard of Ohio had been to a considerable extent prepared for the emergency by the administration of Governor Bushnell, and the Ohio regiments entered the fed- eral service, keeping their organizations as a rule unchanged. Two of them served in Cuba, one, the 8th, being among those transported to Mon- tauk Point after the tropical heat had threatened to decimate their ranks. Another regiment, the 4th, served in Porto Rico, and escaped with less serious consequences than those experienced by its fellows in Cuba. In all no less than 237 men lost their lives during the bloodless service of these volunteer regiments, 72 of them from the
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8th regiment in Cuba, 45 from the other two regiments which saw service, and the rest in the disease-stricken camps on the mainland.
Ohio’s share in this brief war was certainly creditable to the patriotism of the people, and still more to the efficiency of the state adminis- tration. But the war excitement arose and blew over like a thunder-squall in July, and the state returned to its normal life of peaceful industry, showing scarcely any effects from the brief period of tension.
The twentieth century opened for Ohio a long prospect of industrial progress and prosperity. True, the state had not solved all problems, — educational unity was by no means attained, tax reform continued to be vigorously demanded, mu- nicipal organization and corporation regulation were by no means to the satisfaction of all indi- viduals ; but the people of the state were them- selves the assailants of the state’s weak points and the agitators for reforms. The state in its transition from an agricultural to a manufacturing community had retained the traditions of an active public life, and added to the rural simplicity of former days the keen desire for material perfection which develops in a prosperous industrial society. No commonwealth in the Union commanded a fairer prospect or could face the future with greater confidence than Ohio, “ the first fruits of the Ordi- nance of 1787,” on the completion of its centennial as a state.
APPENDIX.
APPENDIX No. L
(See pp. 101, 102.)
EXTRACTS FROM THE TREATY OF PARIS AND THE KING’S PROCLAMATION IN 1763.
I.
Treaty of Paris. “ Article 4. His Most Christian Majesty (France) cedes and guarantees to his Britannic Majesty, in full right, Canada with all its dependencies. His Britannic Majesty, on his side, agrees to grant the liberty of the Catholic religion to the inhabitants of Canada ; he will consequently give the most precise and the most effectual orders that his new Roman Catholic subjects may profess the worship of their religion accord- ing to the rites of the Romish Church, as far as the law-s of Great Britain permit. His Britannic Majesty fur- ther agrees that the French inhabitants or others who had been subject to the Most Christian King, in Canada, may retire with all safety and freedom wherever they shall think proper ; the term limited for this emigration shall be fixed to the space of eighteen months from the exchange of ratifications of this treaty.
“ Article 7. In order to reestablish peace on solid foundations, and to remove forever all subject of dispute
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with regard to the limits of the British and French ter- ritories on the continent of America, it is agreed that for the future the confines between the dominions of his Britannic Majesty and those of his Most Christian Majesty in that part of the world shall be fixed, irrevo- cably, by a line drawn along the middle of the river Mississippi from its source to the river Iberville, and from thence by a line drawn along the middle of this river and the lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain to the sea. . . . Provided that the navigation of the river Mississippi shall be equally free as well to the subjects of Great Britain as to those of France in its whole breadth and length from its source to the sea. The stipulations inserted in the \th Article in favor of the inhabitants of Canada shall also take place with regard to the inhabitants of the countries ceded by this article.”
The King’s Proclamation, October 7, 1763, “ tak- ing into consideration the extensive and valuable acqui- sition in America secured to the crown by the late defini- tive treaty of peace concluded at Paris, February 10, 1763,” declared and established three new governments, styled Quebec, East Florida, and West Florida. After describing the bounds of each of these government's, and the powers and duties of their governors and authori- ties, the proclamation proceeded to deal with the Western territory in the following terms, literally as set forth in its text : —
“ And whereas it is just and reasonable, and essential to Our Interest and the Security of Our Colonies, that the sev- eral Nations or Tribes of Indians with whom We are con- nected, and who live under Our Protection, should not be molested or disturbed in the Possession of such Parts of
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421
Our Dominions and Territories as not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are reserved to them or any of them as their Hunting Grounds, We do therefore, with the Advice of Our Privy Council, declare it to be Our Royal Will and Pleasure, that no Governor or Commander in Chief in any of Our Colonies of Quebeck, East Florida, or West Florida, do presume, upon any Pretence whatever, to grant Warrants of Survey, or pass any Patents for Lands beyond the Bounds of their respective Governments, as described in their Com- mission ; as also that no Governor or Commander in Chief in any of Our other Colonies or Plantations in America do presume for the present, and until Our further Pleasure be known, to grant Warrant of Survey, or pass Patents for any Lands beyond the Heads or Sources of any of the Rivers which fall into the Atlantick Ocean from the West and North-West ; or upon any Lands whatever which, not hav- ing been ceded to or purchased by Us as aforesaid, are re- served to the said Indians, or any of them.
“ And we do further declare it to be Our Royal Will and Pleasure, for the Present as aforesaid, to reserve under Our Sovereignty, Protection, and Dominion, for the Use of the said Indians, all the Lands and Territories not included within the Limits of Our said Three new Governments, or within the Limits of the Territory granted to the Hudson’s Bay Company ; as also all the Lands and Territories lying to the Westward of the Sources of the Rivers which fall into the Sea from the West and North-West as aforesaid ; and We do hereby strictly forbid, on Pain of Our Displeas- ure, all Our loving Subjects from making any Purchases or Settlements whatever, or taking Possession of any of the Lands above reserved, without Our especial Leave and Licence for that Purpose first obtained.
“ And We do further strictly enjoyn and require all Per- sons whatever, who have either wilfully or inadvertently seated themselves upon any Lands within the Countries above described, or upon any other Lands which, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are still reserved to the
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said Indians as aforesaid, forthwith to remove themselves from such settlements.’ 7
General Gage’s Proclamation on December 30, 1764. “ His Majesty grants to the inhabitants of
the Illinois the liberty of the Catholic religion as it has already been granted to his subjects in Canada. He has consequently given the most precise and effective orders to the end that his new Homan Catholic subjects of the Illinois may exercise the worship of their religion according to the rites of the Romish Church in the same manner as in Canada.
“ His Majesty, moreover, agrees that the French in- habitants, or others who may have been subjects of the Most Christian King, may retire in full safety and free- dom wherever they please. Those who choose to retain their lands and become subjects of his Majesty shall enjoy the same rights and privileges, the same security for their persons and effects, and the liberty of trade, as the old subjects of the King.”
APPENDIX No. II.
(See pp. 161-189.)
Mr. Dane’s statements as to the authorship of the Or- dinance of 1787, though of the highest authority, have been almost inaccessible and therefore overlooked. To supply the want in some degree, they are here annexed.
i.
In a letter to Rufus King, July 16, 1787, three days after the Ordinance was passed, he said : —
“ When I drew the Ordinance (which passed, a few words excepted, as I originally formed it) I had no idea the states
APPENDIX.
423
would agree to the sixth article, prohibiting slavery, as only Massachusetts of the Eastern States was present, and there- fore omitted it in the draft. But finding the House favor- ably disposed on this subject, after we had completed the other parts, I moved this article, which was agreed to with- out opposition/ *
II.
Later in life Mr. Dane compiled a work in nine volumes, known as “ Dane’s Abridgment,” being a gen- eral abridgment or digest of the laws of all the states. The volumes were published from year to year as they were completed, and are now almost out of print.
In the seventh volume, issued in 1824, he referred (page 389) to the Ordinance of 1787 in connection with Massachusetts law, and incidentally said : “ This Ordi- nance, formed by the author of this work, was framed mainly from the laws of Massachusetts, especially in regard to land titles, and as to them contains the follow- ing clauses,” etc.
hi.
But in his ninth volume, published in the year 1830, and after the great debates in the Senate on Foote’s resolutions, Mr. Dane, evidently disturbed by the ver- sions put upon the Ordinance by Senators Benton and Hayne, became more explicit, and in an appendix added the following note (Appendix, pp. 74-76), which is given entire : —
“ As, after the lapse of 43 years, some for the first time claim the Ordinance of July 13, 1787, as a Virginia produc- tion, in substance Mr. Jefferson’s, it is material to compare it with his plan or resolve (not ordinance) of April, 1784, in order to show how very groundless the assertion of Senator B. is, that the Ordinance of ’87 was 4 chiefly copied 9 from
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his plan. To those who make the comparison, not a word need be said to refute his assertion ; on the face of them the difference is so visible and essential. But thousands read his speeches, extensively published, where one makes this comparison. It is surprising, at this late day, that this claim is made for Virginia, never made by herself.
44 As but few possess the journals of the old Congress in which Mr. Jefferson ’s plan of ’84 and the Ordinance of ’87, formed by the author, are recorded, it is proper here con- cisely to point out the material difference between them. — I. The plan of ’84 is contained in two pages and a half ; the Ordinance of ’87 in eight pages. II. The first page in the plan or resolve of ’84 is entirely omitted in the Ordi- nance of ’87. III. From the remaining page and a half of the plan there appears to be transferred to the Ordinance in substance these provisions, to wit : 1st. ‘ The said territory, and the states which may be formed therein, shall forever remain a part of this confederacy of the United States of America, subject to the Articles of Confederation.’ 2d. 4 To all the acts and ordinances of the United States in Congress assembled, conformable thereto.’ 3d. 4 The in- habitants and the settlers in the said territory shall be sub- ject to pay their part of the federal debts contracted or to be contracted, to be apportioned on them by Congress according to the same common rule and measure by which apportionments thereof shall be made on the other states.’ 4th. 4 The legislature of those districts or new states shall never interfere with the primary disposal of the soil by the United States in Congress assembled ; nor with any regula- tions Congress may find necessary for securing the title to such soil to the bond fide purchasers.’ 5 th. 4 No tax shall be imposed on lands the property of the United States.’ 6th. 4 And in no case shall non-resident proprietors be taxed higher than residents.’
44 It will be observed the provisions 4,5, and 6, which some now view as oppressive to the West, were taken from Mr. Jefferson’s plan. . . . The residue of the Ordinance of ’87
APPENDIX .
425
consists of two descriptions, one original, as the provisions to prevent legislature enacting laws to impair contracts pre- viously made, — to secure to the Indians their rights and property, — part of the titles to property made more purely republican, and more completely divested of feudality than any other titles in the Union were, in July, 1787. The tem- porary organization was new ; no part of it was in the plan of ’84. The other description was selected mainly from the Constitution and laws of Massachusetts, as any one may see who knows what American law was in ’87 ; as, I. Titles to property by will, by deed, by descent, and by delivery, cited verbatim in the seventh volume of this abridgment, pages 389, 390. Here it may be observed that titles to lands once taking root are important, as they are usually permanent. In this case they were planted in 400,000 square miles of territory, and took root as was intended. II. All the funda- mental, perpetual articles of compact (except as below), — 1st. Securing forever religious liberty ; 2d. The essential parts of a bill of rights declaring that 1 religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged/ These selections from the code of Massachusetts, as also the titles to property, have created for her an extensive and lasting influence in the West, and of the most republican, liberal, and beneficial kind.
“ The organization, providing officers to select or make, to decide on and execute laws, being temporary, was not deemed an important part of the Ordinance of '87. Charles Pinckney assisted in striking out a part of this in 1786.
“ The 6th article of compact, the slave article, is imperfectly understood. Its history is, that in 1784 a committee, con- sisting of Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Chase, and Mr. Howell, re- ported it as a part of the plan of 1784. This Congress struck out ; only two members south of Pennsylvania sup- ported it ; all north of Maryland present voted to preserve it, so to exclude slavery. It was imperfect, first, as it admitted slavery till the year 1800 ; second, it admitted
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slavery in very considerable parts of the Territory forever, as will appear on a critical examination, especially in the parts owned for ages by French, Canadian, and other inhabi- tants, as their property, provided for only in the Ordinance of ’87. In this Ordinance of ’87 slavery is excluded from the date and forever from every part of the whole ‘ territory of the United States northwest of the river Ohio,’ over all which the Ordinance established government.
“ The amended slave article, as it is in the Ordinance of ’87, was added on the author’s motion, but, as the journals show, was not so reported.
“ In the said seventh volume published in 1824 full credit is given to Mr. Jefferson and Mr. King on account of their slave article (too limited), amended in July, ’87, by extend- ing the Ordinance of that date, and the slave article in it, over the whole territory, and to take effect from the date. In 1802 the Indian article was made a fundamental part of a Southern compact. The provision as to impairing con- tracts was afterwards adopted into the Constitution of the United States, also into the several state constitutions, and after forty years’ experience into that of Virginia.
“ In the great Missouri debate in 1820, etc., one Southern member, at least, viewed this Ordinance as a Northern usurpation ; especially as to the six articles of compact. Mr. B. in 1830 claims it as an honor to Virginia and Mr. Jefferson. Colonel Carrington, of Virginia, as chairman of the committee pro forma , reported the Ordinance, but formed no part of it. Of late years this Ordinance has been made a subject of particular importance as proving the authors of it have afforded essential means in promoting the prosperity and rapid growth of the West. It was found in the great Missouri debate that the Southern attempt to run it down would not do. As a Western senator said in that debate in Congress, it had been the cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night in settling the country ; others to the same pur- pose. On this and some ether discoveries, this Northern usurpation, as Charles Pinckney viewed it, is now claimed
APPENDIX.
427
as a Southern production to prove Southern friendship to the West ; also to prove, even in ’87, the East did noth- ing in building up the West. In this point of view the East will not readily yield its just claim in that business, — a claim not denied for forty years and more.
“ On the whole, if there be any praise or any blame in this Ordinance, especially in the titles to property and in the permanent parts, the most important of it belongs to Massa- chusetts, as one of her members formed it and furnished the matter with the exceptions following : First, he was assisted in the committee of ’86, in the temporary organization, al- most solely by Mr. C. Pinckney, who did so little he felt himself at liberty to condemn this Ordinance in that debate. Secondly, the author took from Mr. Jefferson’s resolve of ’84 in substance the said six provisions in the fourth article of compact, as above stated. Thirdly, he took the words of the slave article from Mr. King’s motion made in 1785, and extended its operation as to time and extent of terri- tory, as is above mentioned : as to matter, he furnished the provisions respecting impairing contracts, and the Indian security and some other smaller matters ; the residue, no doubt, he selected from existing laws, etc. In regard to the matter of this note, it is a portion of American law properly and conveniently placed in this appendix. The particular form of this note is in answer to many requests lately made, by members of Congress and others, to be informed respecting the formation, the detail, and authorship of this Ordinance, which in forty years has so often restrained insolvent acts, stop laws, and other improper legislation impairing con- tracts.”
APPENDIX No. III.
(See pp. 244-247.)
The following ballad is not poetry, but in the time of the pioneers was sung with sad emotion, and was so popular that it is worth reproducing as a relic : —
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APPENDIX .
SAINCL AIRE’S DEFEAT.
’Twas November the fourth, in the year of ninety-one,
We had a sore engagement near to Fort Jefferson ; Sainclaire was our commander, which may remembered be, For there we left nine hundred men in t ’ West’n Ter’tory.
At Bunker’s Hill and Quebeck, there many a hero fell, Likewise at Long Island (it is I the truth can tell),
But such a dreadful carnage may I never see again As hap’ned near St. Mary’s, upon the river plain.
Our army was attacked just as the day did dawn,
And soon were overpowered and driven from the lawn. They killed Major Ouldham, Levin and Briggs likewise, And horrid yells of sav’ges resounded through the skies.
Major Butler was wounded the very second fire ;
His manly bosom swell ’d with rage when forc’d to retire ; And as he lay in anguish, nor scarcely could he see, Exclaim’d, “ Ye hounds of hell ! Oh revenged I will be.”
We had not been long broken when General Butler found Himself so badly wounded, was forced to quit the ground ;
“ My God ! ” says he, “ what shall we do? we’re wounded every man ;
Go charge them, valiant heroes, and beat them if you can.”
He leaned his back against a tree, and there resigned his breath,
And like a valiant soldier sunk in the arms of death ;
When blessed angels did await his spirit to convey,
And unto the celestial fields he quickly bent his way.
We charg’d again with courage firm, but soon again gave ground ;
The war-whoop then redoubled, as did the foes around.
APPENDIX. 429
They killed Major Ferguson, which caused his men to cry,
“ Our only safety is in flight, or fighting here to die.”
“Stand to your guns,” says valiant Ford ; “let’s die upon them here,
Before we let the sav’ges know we ever harbored fear ! ”
Our cannon-balls exhausted, and artilPry-men all slain,
Obliged were our musketmen the en’my to sustain.
Yet three hours more we fought them, and then were forc’d to yield,
When three hundred warriors lay stretched upon the field.
Says Colonel Gibson to his men, uMy boys, be not dis- mayed ;
I’m sure that true Virginians were never yet afraid.
“ Ten thousand deaths I ’d rather die than they should gain the field ! ”
With that he got a fatal shot, which caused him to yield.
Says Major Clarke, “ My heroes, I can here no longer stand ;
We’ll strive to form in order, and retreat the best we can.”
The word “ He treat ! ” being passed around, there was a dismal cry,
Then helter-skelter through the woods like wolves and sheep they fly.
This well-appointed army, who but a day before
Defied and braved all danger, had like a cloud passed o’er.
Alas, the dying and wounded, how dreadful was the thought !
To the tomahawk and scalping-knife in mis’ry are brought.
Some had a thigh and some an arm broke on the field that day,
Who writhed in torments at the stake to close the dire af- fray.
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APPENDIX.
To mention our brave officers, is what I wish to do ;
No sons of Mars e’er fought more brave, or with more cour- age true.
To Captain Bradford I belonged, in his artillery,
He fell that day amongst the slain, a valiant man was he.
APPENDIX No. IV.
(See p. 333.)
The following letter of General William H. Harrison, heretofore unpublished, contains facts of much historical interest, particularly his tribute to Colonel Wood. It was written during the excited political canvass in which General Harrison and Mr. Van Buren were the oppos- ing candidates for the Presidency.
North Bend, July 2, 1840.
Hon. Thomas Corwin.
My dear Sir : Colonel Pendleton forwarded to me by yesterday’s mail your letter to him of the 25th ult. General Solomon Van Rensselaer wrote a reply to Armstrong’s book in which the general character of the work is portrayed with great ability and the lash most unmercifully applied. As it regards particulars, however, he only goes to the defense of the operations on the Niagara frontier ; that is to say, as far as his relation (the Patroon) and himself were concerned. I should have answered it myself, but a friend in New York advised against it, as the work had fallen dead from the press. Indeed, I consider that the work, as far as it regarded my conduct, was sufficiently answered by the documents to be found in McAffee’s history of the war and in Dawson’s work. In both of these the opinions of Colonel Wood in favor of my whole course are quoted. And his opinion, in the estimation of every officer who served in that war, would have more weight than fifty Armstrongs. I heard both General Brown and General Scott say that they thought
APPENDIX.
431
Wood the greatest military character that the late war brought forth. Colonel Pendleton, who was the aide-de-camp of General Gaines, informed me that such was the opinion of that officer, and it was always decidedly mine. Wood was with me from the commencement to the end of the operations in the Northwest, and kept a journal in which he made comments upon the military movements which he wit- nessed. After the campaign of 1813, 1 gave him a furlough for a few weeks to visit his friends in the N. E. part of New York. There he copied the journal and deposited it in the library at West Point where he had been educated. This copy was borrowed by Colonel Charles Todd for the use of Me Affee in writing the history of the war. It was intrusted by Todd to an officer, who promised to restore it to the West Point library, which it is supposed he did not do. In the following year, however, Wood’s brother, knowing the attachment which the colonel had for me, came from his residence on Lake Champlain to visit me. He brought with him the original rough journal of Wood, and presented it to me. This (to me) precious document is now in my posses- sion. I think, however, that the parts of it necessary to my defence against Armstrong are quoted by Me Affee and copied by Dawson.
The principal features in the campaign of 1812-13 are the general arrangements for the campaign, the distribution of the corps of the army for the advance to a point of con- centration, and the measures taken previous and subsequent to the defeat at the river Raisin. On each of these Wood has expressed a decided opinion. In speaking of the latter (river Raisin) it will be seen that he says in the most deci- sive manner that nothing more could be done than was done. The points in the campaign of 1813 that deserve particular notice are, the general arrangements for the protection of the frontiers and the preparations for the final advance of the army, the first and second sieges of Fort Meigs, the attack on Fort Stephenson (Lower Sandusky), the general order for forming the army for march and battle, and the battle
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itself (on the Thames). I believe that Wood has given a distinct opinion upon each. It was upon the report made to me by him that an entire change was made in the order of battle at the very moment when it was about to be com- menced in a way entirely different. I had previously under- stood the exact position of the enemy, from the reports of the volunteer officers. But having sent Wood to ascertain the extent of front occupied by the British troops, his mili- tary eye at once discovered what the others had neglected to notice, that is, the open order in which they were drawn up. It was on this report, which I could only credit coming from such a man as Wood, that I immediately changed the plan of the action, which drew forth the encomium of Perry, who witnessed the whole transaction.
Nowit does appear to me that the opinion of Wood should outweigh, eye-witness as he was, those of fifty men who were not present. Governor Shelby and Commodore Perry have also given a most favorable opinion both of the general arrangements and the particular order of battle. The former says that the latter gave such confidence to the army that it could not have been defeated by more than double its numbers. Wood says of it, that, although it was a violation of long-established rules of war, yet he justifies it by saying in the most complimentary way that those and those only who perfectly understand their profession are authorized to depart from these rules. . . .
Yours in haste, but very truly,
W. H. Harrison.
■
APPENDIX No. V.
The following paper on the gradual failure of the grape in Ohio is from one whose long experience in vine culture and in making the native wines, sparkling and still, give him the highest authority on this inter- esting subject : —
APPENDIX .
433
The Grape and its Gradual Failure in Ohio. Culture at one time promised the State of Ohio, for a series of years, a large revenue in the production of grapes, but this prospect did not last for many years. It is about fifty-five years since this noble culture was introduced by Mr. Nicholas Longworth on a large scale. Mr. Longworth was a large owner of land near the city of Cincinnati, and a great amateur of the culture of the grapevine. About the time stated above, he began to lease out to vine-culturists a certain number of acres of land, in which the vine-culturist had to put a given number of acres into grapevines, with the condition that a half of the grapes so produced were to be delivered to Mr. Longworth’s wine-cellars, as the consideration or rent for the land. In this way the culture of grapes was introduced at once in the southern part of this state. The grapes selected by Mr. Longworth, among the lim- ited variety at that time, were the Catawba and Isabella ; the former being an excellent grape for table-use as well as wine-making. History tells us that this Ca- tawba grape was first introduced by Mr. John Adlum, of Georgetown, District of Columbia, sixty-three years ago, and taken up by Mr. Longworth in thus recom- mending it to his vine-dressers. He recommended both the Catawba and the Isabella, but the former took the lead, and the latter disappeared as a vineyard plant, being more subject to the grape diseases than the Catawba. This noble and excellent grape was culti- vated with great success for years. The average yield was about one hundred and twenty bushels per acre of grapes, which, at fifty pounds per bushel, was equal to five hundred gallons of rich must, containing in a favor- able season from ninety to one hundred degrees of sao-
434
APPENDIX .
charine, with a delicate flavor and a fine fruity acid, so well adapted for the production of sparkling wines.
This noble and so much desired grape cannot be pro- duced any more in a paying way in the southern part of the state, on account of the sudden changes of tem- perature, which are owing, as it is generally thought, to the clearing out of the forests. It is about thirty years since the grape-crop began to fail by degrees. Persons for a long time engaged in this culture, the close and less close observers, agree that heavy fogs, wet atmos- phere, changes from warm to cold, without wind, are the causes of our different grape diseases. These observa- tions coincide with the writing of Dr. Hales on plants in general. He says : “ When the plant has taken up a maximum of moisture, and the evaporation is suppressed by a low temperature, or by continued wet weather, the supply of food, the nutrition of the plant, ceases, the juices stagnate and are altered; they now pass into a state in which they become a fertile soil for microscopic plants. When rain falls after hot weather, and is fol- lowed by an atmosphere saturated with moisture, the cooling due to further evaporation ceases, and the plants are destroyed by fire-blast or scorching (in German Sonnenbrand , literally sun-burn or sun-blight).”
If grapevines are surrounded by any of the causes here mentioned, without wind, then the plants and fruits are subject to our different known grape diseases ; but each of these diseases, as the growth advances during the season, appears in a different form, and any of them under favorable circumstances will destroy a rich crop of grapes in part or entirely in a few days.
In the northern part of the state, near a large body of water like Lake Erie, land situated immediately on its
APPENDIX.
435
shores or on the islands, like Kelley’s, Put-in Bay, Mid- dle Bass, etc., the grape culture has a little better success than in the southern part, on account of the temperature being more even and the winds more fre- quent. As proof of the above observations, we might cite California. Along the coasts of the Pacific Ocean, where the climate is dry and no rain falls for months during the growing season, the absorbing power being always in action through the dryness of the atmosphere, the even temperature is undoubtedly the reason of the success oi grane culture in that country.
INDEX
Adams, John Quincy, quoted, 309.
Albemarle, Lord, British minister in Paris, 69.
Algonquins, in war with the Iroquois, 34.
Andastes, conquered by the Five Na- tions, 22, 23, 39.
Anencraos, great chief of the Iroquois, 22, 36.
Anthony, Indian convert of the Mora- vians, 124.
Appendix, No. 1 : Extract from Treaty of Paris, and the King’s Proclama- tion in 1763, 401-404.
No. 2 : Mr. Dane’s statement as to authorship of the Ordinance of 1787, 405-409.
No. 3 : Ballad, Sainclaire’s Defeat, 410-412.
No. 4 : Letter of Gen. Wm. H. Harrison, 412-414.
Army of United States, one regiment, 230 ; increased, 247.
Banks, insolvent, 333 ; United States Branch, 336.
Batts, Capt. Thomas, fails to find the Ohio in 1671, 38.
Beauharnais, Gov., arrangement with Shawanees, 51 ; despatches of, 55, 57.
Berkeley, governor of Virginia, 38.
Bethlehem, centre of Moravian mis- sions, 122.
Blennerhasset, house of, 304 ; busy at Marietta, 310 ; object of expedition, 311 ; law to prevent acts of, 311 ; flight of, at midnight, 312 ; wife of, 313.
Blue Jacket, Shawanees war-chief, 257, 266.
Bonnecamps, chaplain of De Celoron’s expedition, 63.
Borderers, conduct of, towards In- dians, 107.
Boundaries, between colonies and In- dians, 98, 99, 100, 102, 103, 104; insisted on, 173, 174 ; disputed, 356- 361.
Bouquet, a Swiss officer, saves Fort Pitt, 88, 89 ; campaign against In- dians, 90 ; holds council with chiefs, 91 ; fortified camp of, 92 ; rescues captives, 93.
Braddock, Gen., commands British forces in America, 75 ; defeated and destroyed, 75, 76.
Bradstreet, Col., expedition of, 89 ; blunder of, 90.
Brandt, romance concerning, 235 ; in- vited to Philadelphia, 247 ; at Niag- ara, 249.
British, expedition under Braddock, 75 ; declare war against France, 76 ; posts withheld, 231; posts surren- dered, 256.
Broadhead, Col., expedition of, 150 ; reports of, 165, 192.
Brock, Gen., governor of Upper Can- ada, 322; energetic action of, 325; complete victory of, over Hull, 326, 327.
Brough, John, chosen governor, 384, 385 ; speech at inauguration, 386 ; mistakes of, 393 ; rule of promotion, 394.
Buckeye, name given to state, 270 ; furniture, 299.
Burnet, Jacob, author, of “Notes of the Northwest,” 271 ; reminiscences of, 303.
Burnside, humanely avoids fighting in suburbs, 382.
Burr, Aaron, conspiracy of, 309 ; visit to Ohio, 310.
Bushnell, Asa S., 417.
Butler, Gen., on the Ohio, 194 ; second in command under St. Clair, 204.
Canada, ceded to England by treaty of Paris, 80.
Canals, projected, 347 ; importance of, urged by New York, 347 ; com- missioners of, appointed, 337 ; work on, commenced, 349 ; effect of, 350.
Captives among Indians, 25, 26; de*
438
INDEX.
livered to Col. Bouquet, 93 ; mar- riages of, 191.
Cass, Lewis, colonel of regiment under Hull, 321 ; not reinforced by Hull, 325.
Caughnawagas Indians in the West- ern Reserve, 21.
Cayugas, Indians of the Five Nations,
21.
Champlain founds and fortifies Que- bec, 34 ; error of, 34.
Chapman, John (Johnny Appleseed), wanderer in Ohio wilderness, 26.
Charters, of seventeenth century, 29, 31, 161.
Chase, Salmon P.,415.
Chatham, Lord, vote of, 117 ; influ- ence on Mississippi valley, 261.
Cherokees, Indians of Kentucky and Western "Virginia, 21, 39.
Chickasaws, Indian tribe, 49.
Chillicothe, laid out, 264 ; nucleus of Virginians, 265 ; mob at, 283 ; con- vention, 287 ; first session of legis- lature, 292, 294 ; capitol of hewn logs, 297 ; Dr. Cotton’s account of, 340.
Chippewas, Indians of the Northwest, 42 ; in aid of the French, 74.
Cincinnati, inauguration of, 210 ; date of settlement unknown, 212 ; a gar- rison town, 214 ; description of, 214, 215 ; county seat, 240 ; seat of government, 282, 283 ; in 1820, an incorporated city, 343 ; alarm in, 379; threatened by Kirby Smith, 380 ; population of, 402, 405.
Clark, Col. George Rogers, donation of land to, 170 ; efforts to raise ex- pedition against Detroit, 173 ; at- tacks Shawanees, 232, 233.
Cleveland, established by Connecticut settlers, 228 ; population of, 405.
Clinton, Gov. DeWitt, at beginning of work on Ohio Canal, 349 ; tour through southern Ohio, 350.
Colonies, bounds of, 82 ; congress of, at Albany, 55.
Columbia, founded by Stites, 208.
Columbus, state capital, 338; account of, in 1815, 340.
Commission, to treat with Indian council, 248, 249, 250.
Confederacy of Northwest, Great council of, 247, 249, 250, 256 ; power of, broken, 255.
Confederation, articles of, referred to the states, 163 ; proposal of Mary- land delegates, 163, 164; votes of the states, 164 ; signed by Maryland, 167.
Congress, remonstrances to, from land companies, 164 ; insists on its juris-
diction, 165, 169 ; stipulation re- garding territory surrendered, 166, 170 ; report of committee, 167 ; de- lusion of, as to title of Indian lands, 175; appropriates land tc French inhabitants, 222; jurisdiction of, 290 ; enabling act of, 290, 292, 293 ; declaration of war by, 323.
Connecticut, claim of, under charter, 167; cession by, rejected, 168; te- nacity of, 225 ; land company, 226 ; title to Western Reserve, 280 ; town- ships of land company, 305.
Constitution, adopted, 290, 291 ; com- municated to Congress, 292, 293.
Continental Congress, 115 ; opposed to the Quebec Act, 1 17.
Cornbury, Lord, British governor at Albany, 50.
Cornstalk, Shawanee chief, enter- tained by the Moravians, 140.
Cotton, Dr. John, tour of, 339-342 ; describes Chillicothe, 340 ; account of Columbus, quoted, 340.
Councils, on the Muskingum, 91, 93 ; on the Maumee, 95; at Detroit, 96.
Coureurs des bois, 25, 44 ; character of, 47 ; successors to, 48.
Cox, Gen. Jacob D., nominated gov- ernor, 394 ; in Grant’s cabinet, 414.
Crawford, Col. Wm., capture of, and death, 158.
Croghan, George, western deputy of Sir Wm. Johnson, 19, 57 ; efforts of, to win Indians, 66, 67 ; excites In- dians against the French, 69 ; com- putes the loss in Pontiac’s war, 88 ; embassy of, 94 ; captured at the Wabash, 96.
Cutler, Dr. Manasseh, diary of, 187 ; a director of Ohio Company, 195,
Dane, Nathan, author of provision against slavery in the Ordinance of 1787, 6, 187, 188, Appendix No. 2.
Day, William R., 414.
Dayton, laid out, 264.
De Celoron, Major, expedition of, against English traders and Indians, 60-63 ; commandant at Detroit, 65 ; reduces Ohio tribes to submission, 71.
Delawares, a scattered tribe, 21, 54 ; persecuted in Pennsylvania, 53 ; oppressed by the Six Nations, 54; treat for peace, 90 ; relations of, with Moravians, 123, 128, 129 ; three totems, 127 ; division in council of, 141 , 142 ; neutrality of, 143.
Democracy, American, 186.
Demoiselle, chief of the Twightwees,
INDEX . 439
head of league against French, 59, 60, 62.
De Monts, receives first grant made of American soil, 34.
Denman, Matthias, land of, opposite mouth of Licking, 206, 208 ; arrival of, 210.
Dennison, Gov., appoints McClellan to command of Ohio troops, 470 ; cares for guarding frontiers, 371 ; why not renominated, 374.
Denny, Major, extract from diary of, 199.
Denonville, French governor-general, orders campaign against the Five Nations, 43.
De Peyster, Major, commandant at Detroit, 153 ; holds a council, 156.
De Soto, at the Mississippi, 32.
Detroit, Fort, founded by French in 1701, 45; route from Canada to Louisiana, 46 ; Sir Wm. Johnson present at, 86 ; how saved in Pon- tiac’s war, 88 ; centre of control over Indian tribes, 46, 96 ; occupancy of, by British, 173 ; entered by United States troops, 267 ; surrender of, 332.
D’Iberville, report of, warning against English, 49, 50.
Dinwiddie, Gov., sends commissioners to treat with Indians, 70 ; letter of, to French commander, 73; urgent appeals of, 74 ; pledges land grants to soldiers, 101.
Dongan, Colonel Thomas, aggressive policy of, 42, 46.
Druyer, Peter, a Canadian in British service, 114.
Duer, Col. Wm., secretary of Treasury Board, 196 ; represents New York- ers, 216 ; dealings with Ohio Com- pany, 219, 220, 221 ; appointed commissary, 245.
Dunmore, Lord, plan of, to invade Ohio, 109 ; at Camp Charlotte, 110 ; treaty of, 111.
Du Quesne, Marquis, succeeds Jon- quiere as governor, 72.
Elliott, a Tory agent, 147 ; accompa- nies Pomoacan against the Mora- vians, 154 ; in council with Indians, 250.
Elsquatawa, “ the prophet,” brother of Tecumseh, 316, 317.
English, claim of, to the trans- Alleghany regions, 23, 24, 29, 30, 31 ; traffic of, with Indians of the West, 48, 51, 52; colonies indifferent to affairs on the Ohio, 74, 75.
Eries, powerful Indian tribe, 22 ;
warriors of, exterminated, 23 ; why called Chats by French, 36.
Fifteenth Amendment, rejected, 415.
Filson, John, 209, 211.
Five Nations, Iroquois Indians, 21 ; wars with Eries and Andastes, 22, 23, 29 ; dominion of, 23 ; conquest to the Mississippi, 39, 40 ; invaded by French, 43 ; surrender of title to the English, 45.
Florida, ceded by Spain at treaty of Paris, 80.
Fort Du Quesne, built by French, 74 ; evacuated and blown up, 77 ; ordered to be rebuilt, 78.
Fort Finney, treaty of, 175.
Fort Harmar, treaty of, 175, 177 ; colony at, 230.
Fort McIntosh, treaty of, 175, 192.
Fort Pitt, rescue of, 88.
Fort Stanwix (Rome, N. Y.), treaty of, 98, 103-106, 162, 168, 175.
Fort Washington, on the Ohio, 213 ; at Losantiville, 240.
Fort Wayne, at head of the Maumee, 256.
France, proclaims her dominion, 61, 62; controls Ohio and the North- west, 74; declares war with Eng- land, 76.
Franklin, Dr., connection with land companies, 100, 106.
French, early settlements of, in Cana- da, 34 ; first collision with English, 58 ; memorial, 76 ; in Illinois, 83 ; traders arrested, 94 ; trading-post resort of malcontent Indians, 96 ; complaint of, 116 ; on shores of Lake Erie, 189 ; refugees deceived, 215- 222.
French Creek (Le Bceuf), Marin’s fort at, 72.
Gage, Gen., proposal of, for bounda- ries of colony, 100.
Galissoniere, Marquis de la, reduces Indian outbreak, 60 ; is recalled to France, 61.
Gallipolis, settlement of French refu- gees, 218, 220, 222.
Gamelin, Antoine, trader, 242.
Garfield, James A., born in Ohio, 414.
Girty, Simon, sent by Lord Dunmore to Logan, 112 ; befriends Kenton, 113 ; secret Tory agent, 147 ; leader of party to assassinate Zeisberger, 148 ; tries to save Crawford, 159.
Gist, Captain Christopher, explores Ohio, 19 ; sent out by Ohio Com- pany, 65, 66, 67 ; describes the coun- try, 68; acts as guide to Washing- ton, 73.
440
INDEX.
Gladwin, commandant at Detroit, 88.
Glickhickan, leader of Delaware war- riors, 124 ; joins the Moravians, 125, 129 ; reception of Wyandots, 144 ; speech of, 145, 146; conduct when seized -at Salem, 155.
Gnadenhiitten, burial of relics at, 159.
Goschocking, new capital of Metawat- wes, 140; uncomfortable to the peace party, 149.
Goshen, establishment of Moravians, 159.
Grant, Ulysses S., born in Ohio, 414.
Greenville, treaty of, 256, 257, 258 ; never violated by Indians, 262.
Hamar, Gen. Thomas L., death of, 362.
Hamilton County, established, 240, 241.
Hamilton, Gen., leading delegate of New York, 169.
Hamilton, Gov., letter of, to Gov. Clinton, 63 ; imprisoned, 148.
Harmar, Gen., commandant on the Ohio, 193 ; regiment of, comprises whole of United States army, 230 ; in command against the Miamis, 243 ; defeat of, 244.
Harris, Mary, Indian captive, 25.
Harrison, Benj. H., born in Ohio, 414.
Harrison, Gen. Wm. Henry, opinion of, on works of mound-builders, 11; discourse of, before Historical So- ciety, 40 ; appointed secretary, 268 ; delegate to Congress, 271 ; breaks up siege of Fort Wayne, 329 ; com- mander-in-chief of Northwest, 330 ; in battle of the Thames, 333.
Hayes, Rutherford B., 414.
Heckewelder, Moravian missionary, 127 ; return of, to Moravian lands, 159 ; at Gnadenhiitten, 160.
Hillsborough, Lord, opponent of land companies, 101, 106.
Hull, Gen. William, appointed to com- mand Western Department, 320; march of, to rapids of the Maumee, 321 ; incapacity of, 322-325 ; terror of the savages, 327 ; sentence and pardon, 328.
Hurons, chief village of, 20 ; defeat the Iroquois, 34 ; become known as Wyandots, 35 ; near Detroit, 46 ; at Sandusky, 52, 59 ; border raid of, 145.
Hutchins, Thomas, a surveyor of lands, 174.
Illinois Indians, driven west by Five Nations, 39, 40 ; drive back the Iro- quois, 41 ; refusal of, to attack the forces of the Five Nations, 43.
Indian eloquence, 87 ; tribes on the Scioto, 89, 90 ; on the Wabash and Mississippi, 94 ; captives delivered,
93 ; visitors to Moravian villages, 133, 134 ; boundary, 257, 258.
Indians (see, also, tribal names), 20, 21 ; deny English claim, 24 ; at west end of Lake Ontario, 37 ; great as- sembly of, at Montreal, 41 ; under French allegiance, 45 ; exasperation of, 69 ; lands of, 81, 82 ; consent to British occupation of French ports,
94 ; Northwest confederacy of, 175 ; speech sent to Congress, 176 ; danger from, 201, 202; hatred of, to Vir- ginians, 231 ; war with Kentuckians, 232 ; attack military on the Mus- kingum, 235 ; treaty ratified by, 236 ; war parties of, 242 ; purchase from, 305 ; treaties with, 306, 338.
Insolvency, general state of, 334.
Irish, in emigration to Ohio, 56.
Iron, meteoric, found in the mounds, 16, 17.
Iroquois (Five Nations) war with Eries and Andastes, 22, 23 ; fight on Lake Erie, 27 ; defeat by Hurons, 34 ; hostility to French, 35 ; con- federacy humbled, 36, 41.
Jackson, President, acts as peace- maker between Ohio and Michigan, 361.
Jefferson, praises Logan’s eloquence, 112 ; anti-slavery proposition, 163 ; project for seventeen states, 178; proclamation of, 309.
Joliet, first white traveler on Lake Erie, 37.
Johnson, Col. Richard M., in com- mand of mounted brigade, 332 ; fight of, with Indians, 334.
Johnson, Sir William, English colo- nial agent, 23 ; superintendent of Indian affairs, 57 ; journeys to De- troit, 85, 86; accepts gift of land, 97 ; speech of, at conference, 99 ; connected with land companies, 100 ; the king’s representative, 103 ; sin- gular apology of, 105 ; censured by Lord Hillsborough, 108.
Joncaire, French partisan leader, 50 ; furnishes arms to Indians, 54 ; re- ports to Beauharnais, 55, 57 ; plots to cut off Washington, 73.
Jones, Rev. David, visits Shoenbrun, 134 ; among Shawanees, 135 ; quoted, 191, 192.
Jonquiere, succeeds Galissoniere as governor, 65.
Judges, territorial, 238, 239 ; ap- pointed, 294; discharged, 314.
Jury, right of trial by, 314.
INDEX.
441
Kaskaskias, British post captured by Virginian troops, 163.
Kenton, Simon, captured by Shawa- nees, 113, 114 ; sent to Detroit, 115.
Kentucky, suffering in, 230 ; inclined to rebellion, 372; occupied by Gen. Bragg, 380.
Kickapoos, Indians, in the Ohio coun- try, 21 ; captors of Col. Croghan, 95.
Killbuck, Delaware Indian, friendly to Moravians, 136, 137 ; seeks safety at Pittsburgh, 149.
Knox, Secretary of War, 244, 245.
Lafayette, praises Ohio, 345 ; passage in Tour Qf, quoted, 351.
Lake Chautauqua, 2.
Lake Erie, alleged battle on, 27 ; mo- nopoly on, 356.
Lancaster, disgraceful scene at treaty of, 70.
Land companies, suppressed by the war, 97 ; receive new impulse, 100 ; exertions of, in London, 106; re- monstrances to Congress, 164, 168.
Lands, military claimants of, 101 ; strife over, 164-168 ; title to, through Six Nations, 165, 167 ; given by Con- gress, 355, 356.
La Salle, Sieur de, expedition of, to discover the Ohio, 37, 38 ; effects combination against the Iroquois, 41.
Laws, issued in writing, 237, 239.
Le Boeuf (French Creek), Marin’s fort at, 72.
Lee, Thomas, president of Virginia council, 63.
Lewis, Gen., attacked by Indians, 110.
Lichtenau, Moravian settlement, 140, 141, 142 ; visit of Wyandots, 144 ; , abandoned by mission, 148.
Little Turtle, Miami chief, who defeats St. Clair, 246 ; assaults stockade fort, 253 ; speeches of, 257, 259, 260.
Logan, a Mingo warrior, speech of, at Camp Charlotte, 112 ; saves Kenton, 114.
Longueil, French commandant at De- troit, 60.
Loramie, Peter, the trading-post of, es- tablished, 96 ; rendezvous of hostile Indians, 233.
Loskiel, Moravian bishop, visit of, 159.
Losantiville, settlement opposite the mouth of the Licking, 211 ; name changed to Cincinnati, 214.
Loudoun, Lord, mismanagement of, 76.
Ludlow, Israel, chief surveyor of Mi- ami associates, 210, 211.
Madison, leading member of Virginia delegation, 168 ; aided by influence
of New York, 169 ; councils and me- diation of, 169 ; chairman of com- mittee, 171.
Malartie, Count, officer in St. Clair’s campaign, 223; letter to St. Clair, 224.
Marietta, claim of, incorrect, 119; name of, 198 ; fortification at, 198 ; emigrants to, 200; mill-wheel in river at, 299 ; vessels from, 308.
Marin, commands force sent by Du Quesne, 72 ; death of, 73.
Marquette, Father, discovers the Up- per Mississippi, 37.
Maryland, declaration of legislature, 164 ; signs articles of confederation, 167.
Mason, Stevens Thompson, acting gov- ernor of Michigan, 360 ; orders out militia, 361.
Massacre of Christian Indians, 157.
Mastodon, bones of, 18, 19, 20.
May, Col. John, earliest journalist of colony at Marietta, 199 ; reminis- cences of, 201.
McArthur, Col. Duncan, commands regiment from Scioto valley, 323; captures military supplies, 324 ; sent to the Maumee, 327 ; occupies De- troit, 332.
McClellan, George B., appointed to command of United States armies, 370 ; extreme caution of, 371.
McClung, Col. D. W., 368, note.
McCook, Major Daniel, killed in skir- mish, 383; sons of, fall in battles during the war, 383.
McKee, deputy Indian agent, inhuman- ity of, 147, 148 ; causes trouble to Moravians, 152, 153 ; a mischief- maker, 250, 256 ; house of, de- stroyed, 255.
McKinley, Wm., born in Ohio, 414.
Meigs, Gov., calls for volunteers, 321.
Mexico, war with, 361.
Miamis (Twightwees), 21 ; driven be- yond Mississippi, 39 ; country of, 40, 41 ; enter Ohio under French protection, 45 ; fort of, 46 ; delega- tion to British governor, 50 ; with- draw from French, 52, 57 ; capture French fort, 59; decide in council against French, 67 ; fail of aid from English, 71, 86 ; confederacy of, humbled, 74 ; procure release of Croghan, 95 ; at head of Maumee River, 243, 244; country of, de- scribed, 260.
Miamis Valley, attractions of, 202, 203 ; grant of, 204. *
Michigan, surrendered by English, 266 ; in Wayne County, 267 ; omitted from delegation, 286 ; conflict with
442
INDEX.
Ohiq as to boundary, 356 ; territory of, declared subject to disposal of Congress, 357 ; arrogance of, 360, 361 ; admitted as a state, 361.
Military Bounty lands, laid out, 263.
Militia, measures for organizing, 385 ; legislation concerning, needed, 394.
Mingoes (Senecas), 20 ; outlaws of the Five Nations, 21 ; punished by Major Crawford, 112.
Minnesota, sixth state within confines of Northwest Territory, 181.
Mississippi Land Company, composed of Virginians, 106.
Mississippi River, 32 ; upper waters discovered by Joliet and Marquette, 37 ; free navigation of, claimed, 173.
Mohawks profess neutrality, 326.
Mohicans, Lenni-Lenape Indians, 122, 123.
Montour, Andrew, Canadian half- breed, 50, 66.
Moravians, accompany the Delawares, 54 ; missions on Muskingum de- stroyed, 108 ; plant first settlements in Ohio, 119 ; origin of, 120 ; tenets, 121 ; missionaries, 122, 123 ; opposed to war, 125 ; naturalized as Dela- wares, 126; removed to Ohio, 129, 130, 131 ; government and policy, 132 ; church, 132 ; style of preach- ing, 137 ; mission villages of, 140, 149, 155 ; influence on Indians, 143, 144 ; the “ Pilgrims ” of Ohio, 160.
Morgan, John, movements of, in Ken- tucky, 379 ; invades Ohio, 382 ; march of, a race for safety, 382 ; de- feat of, 383.
Mounds, without a history, 10 ; nu- merous in Ohio, 11, 12 ; purpose of, 12 ; antiquity, 13 ; contents, 14, 15, 16, 17.
Muskingum, town of Wyandots, 66 ; lands on, 140, 195 ; settlements on, 192 ; emigrants to, 200 ; capital of the Northwest, 234.
Natural gas, discovery of, 403.
Negro suffrage, “ visible admixture ” law, 415.
Netawatwes, head chief of Delawares, 127, 139, 142 ; death, 143.
Newalike, forsakes Moravians, 142.
New York, patriotic example of, 165; cession of territory, 167.
Nicolas, chief of Huron conspiracy, 59 ; departs to far west, 60.
Northwest Territory, status of, 163 ; British posts in, 163 ; to be formed into states, 170 ; government of, in- stalled, 199, 234 ; military pests in, 230 ; division of, 275, 276, 277, 283.
Ohio Canal, work on, commenced,
349.
Ohio Company, formed, 63 ; object of, 64 ; merged in Walpole Company, 107 ; for purchase and settlement of western lands, 195 ; domains of, en- larged, 196, 216 ; sale to Scioto Com- pany, 220, 221.
Ohio River, 2 ; failure of efforts to discover, 37, 38 ; contest for trade on, 58 ; English traders on, busy and defiant, 65; importance of its possession, 78, 79; entry on lands beyond, prohibited, 164 ; jurisdiction over waters of, 172 ; ordinance for surveying west of, 174 ; the beautiful river, 190 ; great flood in, 212 ; north of, hostile, 230, 231 ; warfare on banks of, 233 ; the boundary line, 250, 251.
Ohio territory and state, area of, 1 ; hills, 2, 3 ; rivers, 4 ; at first settle- ment, 4, 5 ; slavery in, 6 ; public lands, 6, 7 ; phenomenal growth, 7, 8 ; early emigration to, 28 ; part of trans- Alleghany wilds, 29 ; history obscure at beginning of eighteenth century, 44 ; occupation of, by In- dian tribes, 45 ; first white popula- tion French, 46 ; character of earli- est settlers, 47 ; French posts, 48 ; primary stratum of Anglo-Saxon life, 56; inception of her history, 61 ; first map of boundaries, 63 ; glimpse of, 68, 69 ; wholly in posses- sion of French, 74 ; domain of, vested in English king, 83, 84 ; plan for invasion of, 109 ; transferred to connection with Canada, 117 ; no civil magistrates, 118 ; first Mora- vian settlement, 119; first church, 131 ; matters from 1774 until 1795, 152 ; difference of manners and cus- toms, in different quarters, 171 ; never a dependency of Vincennes, 172 ; beginning of land system, 174 ; proof of wisdom of prohibition of slavery, 180; contest with Michi- gan, 184 ; earliest account of, 189, 190 ; farms in, 191 ; abundance and fruitfulness of, 201 ; from 1787 to 1796, 224; opened to emigrants, 263 ; last of Indian wars, 266 ; last buffalo killed, 26G ; first public sale of lands, 266 ; earliest internal im- provement, 267, 268 ; census, 269 ; first assembly at Cincinnati, 270, 271, 272 ; settlers from Connecticut, 226, 227 ; struggle to set aside the plan of the ordinance, 281, 282, 284 ; the Scioto not a proper boundary, 285 ; convention authorized, 287 ; why the Buckeye state, 270 ; slavery
INDEX.
443
in, disallowed, 272 ; counties of, 269, 272, 273, 276, 281 ; weakness in form of government, 291 ; first ses- sion of legislature, 292, 293 ; became a state, 295, 339; immigrants, 296; hardships of , 297, 298,299; primeval conditions, 300, 301, 303, 304;
schools, 302, 303; new counties, 305; lands, 305; traffic, 307, 308; first essay in war, 320, 321; panic, 328, 329; last invasion of, 331; rec- ords wanting, 334; debts of, 334, 335 ; character of emigration to, 344, 345; trade hazardous, 346; growth and prosperity, 350; literary and scientific culture, 354, 355; bound- ary question, 356-361 ; quota in war with Mexico, 362; change of opin- ion with regard to slavery, 363, 364, 365; benevolent institutions, 366; war legislation, 368, 369 ; volunteers, 367 ; menaced by states in rebellion, 371; soldiers furnished, 372, 373, 377, 386, 397; special relief sent, 376; the draft, 378, 379, 395; inva- sion under Morgan, 382, 383; polit- ical campaign of 1863, 384; militia, 386; law for provision for soldiers’ families, 387, 388; recruiting system, 389; National Guard, 390; distin- guished officers, 396; conspicuous statesmen, 396 ; throughout the war, 397, 398, 399; economic and social transformation since the Civil War, 401-406; increase of popula- tion, 402, 405; industrial develop- ment, 402^405 ; discovery of natural gas, 403 ; decline of agriculture, 404, 405 ; conservative government, 406,
407 ; legislation since the Civil War,
408 ; judicial history since the Civil War, 409, 410; political prominence, 411, 412; “the Ohio Idea,” 412; political parties and struggles, 412, 413, 415, 416 ; liquor tax act, and “ Scott law,” 416, 417 ; “ Dow law,” 417 ; in the Spanish War, 417, 418.
Oldmixon, earliest historian of the colonies, 49.
Onondaga, Indian speaker at confer- ence, 99.
Ordinance of 1787, for government of Northwest Territory, 180-188 ; with regard to new states, 184 ; a master- piece and model, 181, 182 ; two im- portant articles of, 185, 186 ; author- ship of, 187 ; the settlers’ guide, 262.
Ottawas, 21 ; move eastward, 41 ; under French allegiance, 45, 46, 65 ; quarrel with Miamis, 50 ; at council, 67 ; kill and devour Miami chief, 71 ; constant to the French, 74, 88.
Ouiatanons (Weas), a clan of the Miami nation, 21, 55.
Pachgantschihilas, a Delaware war chief, advice of, 151.
Paint Creek, encounter at, 265.
Pakanke, chief of clan of Delawares, 124 ; opposes Moravians, 125 ; is conciliated, 126.
Parsons, Samuel H. , 193 ; director in Ohio Co., 195, 196 ; prefers Scioto to Muskingum, 200.
Patterson, Col. Robert, 208.
Peace secured, 263.
Pearls, in the mounds, 14, 17 ; in the Little Miami, 17.
Pendleton, George H., 414.
Pennsylvania, road through, to Ohio, 56 ; lands ceded to, 104, 105.
Pennsylvanians, 3 ; sent to France as spies, 69 ; farms of, in Ohio, 263.
Perry, Commodore, on Lake Erie, 331.
Piankeshaws, a tribe of Miamis, 67; king of, angry with Ottawa speaker, 67 ; king, killed and devoured by Ottawas, 71.
Pioneers, struggles of, 296, 298 ; food of, 298, 299 ; furniture and clothing, 299 ; festivities, 300, 301 ; camp- meetings, 301 ; sufferings from sick- ness, 308.
Pipe, Capt., leader of Delaware war- party, 138; town of, centre of dis- affected Indians, 142 ; influence in council, 148 ; departs to Wyandots, 149 ; at Salem, with Pomoacan, 154 ; at Detroit with missionaries before the governor, 156, 157 ; later days of, 198.
Pitt, William, prime minister in Great Britain, 77 ; letter of, on capture of Fort Du Quesne, 78 ; influence on Mississippi Valley, 261.
Pittsburgh Landing, relief sent to battlefield of, 376.
Pomoacan, Wyandot chief, 143 ; cove- nants with Moravians, 144, 145 ; hos- tile expedition of, 153, 154.
Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas, 85, 86 ; genius and work of, 88 ; reconciled to English, 95 ; speech of, 96.
Post, Christian Frederick, Journal of, quoted, 56 ; pioneer of Moravians on the Muskingum, 127.
Pottawatomies, Indians of the North- west, 41.
Pownall, Gov., English colonial agent, 23,24.
Proclamation by English government, 81, 82, 83. .
Proctor, Gen., failures of, at Fort Meigs, 333.
444
INDEX.
Public lands, ordinance for survey- ing, 174 ; Indian title necessary, 174; grants of, 194 ; purchase of, 195; sale of, 266, 279; sold on credit, 334.
Putnam, Gen. Rufus, director in Ohio Company, 195 ; leader of company of settlers, 197, 198 ; surveyor-gen- eral, 263.
Quebec Act, effects of, 115, 116, 117.
Randolph, John, defends prohibition of slavery, 180.
Resolution, at a meeting of officers on the Ohio, 111.
Rittenhouse, special geographer of Pennsylvania, 174.
Rivers, traffic on, 307, 308.
Road, the national, 307 ; crossing- place on the Ohio at Wheeling, 307.
Salem, Moravian settlement at, 149; last service at, 156.
Salt Springs, appropriated by whites, 191.
Sandusky, expedition to, under Craw- ford, 158; river, 189, 190.
Schools, foundation of, 302 ; lands of, squandered, 347 ; commissioners au- thorized, 348 ; inequality in, 352 ; hostility to, 352 ; table of studies pursued in, 353, 354.
Scioto Company, frauds of, 197, 215, 216, 217.
Scioto River, proposed for boundary, 285.
Scott, Gen., governor of Kentucky, 329.
Senecas, most westerly and most nu- merous of the Five Nations, 21, 23 ; mission among, 35 ; plan of attack on, 43 ; persistent hostility of, 108.
Senators, chosen, 294.
Shawanees, on the Scioto, 21, 22, 94; claim to be a southern people, 27 ; contests of, with Five Nations, 39, 40, 41 ; enter Ohio under French protection, 45 ; on the Wabash, 51 ; movements of, 53, 54, 55 ; open the way for traders, 55, 56 ; treat for peace, 90 ; meet Bouquet in council, 93 ; in council with Sir Wm. John- son, 99 ; bold assertion of, 100 ; lead in wars on the Ohio, 107, 108 ; at Camp Charlotte, 110; attend Mora- vian preaching, 130 ; are more re- fractory, 135; visit Gnadenhutten, 140 ; encampment of, 211 ; raid of, 266.
Sherman, John, 414.
Sherman, Taylor, contribution of, to history of Ohio, 305, 306.
Shoenbrun, seat of Moravian mission, 129, 131, 136 ; abandoned, 142.
Simcoe, British governor, entertains commissioners at Niagara, 249 ; erects fort, 251 ; plots of, 256.
Sioux, tribes of, against the Hurons, 35.
Six Nations (see Tuscaroras), 21, 55; complaint of, 56 ; at treaty of Lan- caster, 70; conference with, 98; resolve as to boundaries, 104, 105 ; chiefs of, 247, 249, 250.
Slavery, prohibition of, 179, 180; article in Ordinance, 185 ; tacit tol- erance of, 354 ; changes in struggle concerning, 365.
Smith, Capt. James, captured by In- dians, 26; pictures Ohio tribes, 194.
Smith, Capt. John, 31.
Smith, Robert, a trader, 19.
Spain, pretensions of, 32, 33.
Spies, employed by Gen. Wayne, 253.
Spottswood, Gov., 31; despatches of, 47 ; plan proposed by, 64.
Squatters, from the Potomac, 101, 102; west of the Ohio, 193, 194.
Stanton, Edwin M., 414.
States, in Northwest Territory, 170, 178.
Stations, on the Ohio and Miami, 215.
St. Clair, Gen. Arthur, letter of, to President, 177 ; governor of North- west Territory, 196, 229, 230 ; report of, 217 ; inaugurates government, 234 ; attempts to conciliate Indians, 235, 236; law-making of, 237, 238; instructions of, from Congress, 239, 240 ; settles land claims on the Wa- bash and Mississippi, 240, 241 ; pre- pares expedition against Miamis, 243 ; appointed to the command, 244; terrible defeat of, 245, 246 ; at meeting of first assembly, 271, 272 ; responsible for discord, 274 ; project for dividing the Territory, 275, 276, 277 ; speech at Chillicothe, 278; movement of, to disturb the plan of the Ordinance, 284 ; speech of, 288 ; public career ended, 288 ; persecution of, 289 ; characteristics of, 289, 290.
Steamboats, on the Ohio, 318; on Lake Erie, 319.
Stites, Benjamin, discovers valley of the Miami rivers, 202; fortifies a town (Columbia) on the Little Mi- ami, 208.
St. Pierre, in command of French at Le Boeuf, 73.
Stuart, John, superintendent of In- dian affairs at the South, 102.
Symmes, John Cleves, petitions Con- gress for land grant, 204 ; covenant
INDEX.
445
and prospectus of, 205 ; mismanage- ment of, 206 ; prevents attack on Indians, 211 ; letter to Secretary of War, 213; appointed judge, 219 ; at Marietta, 238.
Tanacharisson, a chief of the Senecas, 72, 73.
Taylor, Gen. Zachary, occupies left bank of Rio Grande, 361, 362.
Tecumseh, acquiring importance, 316; anecdote of, 316 ; plans to drive whites across the Ohio, 317 ; con- flicts of, with Gen. Hull, 327 ; in command of large force of Indians, 333 ; death of, 334.
Tennessee River, the way of traders to the Ohio and the Mississippi, 49.
Texas, annexation of , 361, 363.
Thomson, Charles, account of Dela- ware exodus by, 53.
Thurman, Allen G., 414.
Tod, David, elected governor, 375 ; calls for volunteers, 378 ; efficient administration of, 384 ; system of promotion, 392.
Tomahawk titles to lands in Ohio, 191.
Tonti, lieutenant of La Salle, 41, 43.
Traders, up the Great Lakes, 42 ; of Southern colonies, 49, 51 ; of Penn- sylvania, 55, 56 ; English, in Ohio, 51 ; arrested by the French, 65 ; bad character of, 126, 127 ; married to Indian captives, 191.
Treasury Board, powers of, 195,
Treaty of Paris, provisions of, 78, 80.
Tuscaroras, incorporated with Five Nations, 21, 54.
Twightwees, clans of the Miamis, 21, 40 ; strong town of, 67 ; king of, 67, 71 ; at council on the Maumee, 96.
United Brethren, name assumed by Moravians, 120, 128.
United States, successor to the crown domain, 171 ; title of, to lands north of the Ohio, 172 ; title to lands in Western Reserve, 280.
Vaudreuil, Gov., despatch of, 51.
Vincennes, Sieur de, sent to regain control over Miamis, dies, 51.
Vincennes, British post, captured by Virginian troops, 163.
Virginia, 30; as affected by plan of Walpole Company, 100 ; by treaty of Fort Stanwix, 104 ; convention of, adopt constitution, 161 ; extent of, 162 ; manifesto of, 161, 162 ; stat- ute passed in 1779, 164 ; position of, with regard to western territory, 165, 166, 168 ; compromise accepted by, 169 ; title of, not admitted, 170 ;
military district in Ohio conceded to soldiers, 170 ; special claim of, to concessions, 172 ; no conquests by, east of the Wabash, 173.
Virginians (squatters), excite Indian hostility, 101, 102; entry of lands on military warrants, 224.
Volney, visit of, to Gallipolis, 223.
Wabash, tribes on, 94, 95.
Wade, Benjamin F., 414.
Waite, Morrison R., 415.
Wakatamica, Shawanees town (now Dresden), 92, 130.
Walpole Company, 97 ; revival of, 100 ; grant to, 106.
Washington County, established, 234.
Washington, George, envoy to French at Le Boeuf, 73 ; letter of, 74 ; colo- nel in army of Gen. Forbes, 77 ; op- ponent of land monopolies, 101 ; connection of , with Mississippi Com- pany, 106 ; inaugurated, 239 ; funeral honors, 273 ; life of, in Latin, 303.
Wayne, Gen. Anthony, opinion of, with regard to the mounds, 11 ; sub- dues hostile Indians, 25 ; forms the “Legion,” 248, 249, 255; camp at Greenville, 252 ; precautions of, 252, 253 ; Indian names for, 253 ; victory at rapids of Maumee, 255, 256 ; commissioner, 257 ; speech of, 258 ; one of founders of. the Northwest, 261.
Western Reserve, settled from Con- necticut, 171 ; cession of, 225.
Western territories, temporary gov- ernment of, 178, 183 ; powers of governors in, 183, 184.
Western Virginia, cleared of hostile forces, 371.
White-eyes, Capt., head war-chief of Delawares, 138, 139 ; in council at Pittsburgh, 141, 142 ; death of, 143.
Wieser, Conrad, speech of, 56.
Wilkinson, Gen., a mischief-maker, 309.
Williamson, David, merciless conduct of, 157.
Wolfe, victory of, at Quebec, 77.
Wolverine war, 184.
Wood, Major E. D., Gen. Harrison’s chief engineer, 333.
Worthington, opponent of St. Clair, 284; in Washington, 284,285,286; agent of convention, 290, 292, 293 ; speech of, when governor, 338.
Wyandots (Hurons), 20, 22 ; original name of, 35 ; enter Ohio under French protection, 45 ; council at town of, 66 ; hostility of, 108 ; ap- pear at Goschocking, 144, 145 ; losses of, 256 ; peaceable and orderly, 315 ;
446
INDEX.
last tribe to remove from Ohio,
339.
Zane, Col. Ebenezer, reported advice of, 200 ; contracts for road for mail route, 267.
Zanesville, seat of government, 314 ; described, 339.
Zeisberger, David, head of Moravian missions in Ohio, 122 ; received by Delaware chief, 127, 128, 129 ; visits the Shawanees, 130 ; declines to at- tend council of Six Nations, 141 ; labors of, 159 ; death, 160.
Zinzendorf, Count, bishop of the Mo- ravians, 122.
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